WHAT ARE YOU READING? - Part 4

Dit is een voortzetting van het onderwerp WHAT ARE YOU READING? - Part 3.

Dit onderwerp werd voortgezet door WHAT ARE YOU READING? - Part 5.

DiscussieClub Read 2020

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WHAT ARE YOU READING? - Part 4

1AnnieMod
mei 18, 2020, 8:42 pm

With the restrictions being slowly (and not so slowly in some places) lifted, how is everyone doing?

We seem to be chattier this year compared to last (except for me - I am still missing somewhere) so time for Thread #4 in mid-May :)

Come and tell us - what are you reading these days?

2torontoc
mei 18, 2020, 11:19 pm

I just started The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates- Recently I have wanted to read more non-fiction but this novel is good( I am on page 23 so far.

3mabith
mei 19, 2020, 12:11 am

I've gotten a good ways into Wolf Hall, trying to break out of my reading slump. The lack of socialization is really taking a toll on me, to the extent that I'm considering asking my dad to come for a visit (he is not generally that pleasant to be around).

4avaland
mei 19, 2020, 6:35 am

In a bit of a daytime reading hiatus, likely due to spending much of my time working outside on various gardens and other house projects. The weather finally is seasonal. I do admit to spending some time just sitting on the deck watching the various birds do their thing. Still reading a Lars Kepler at bedtime, 5 or 6 pages before I start to drift off and there are numerous children's books on the three days we wrangle the 5 year old grandson.

5japaul22
mei 19, 2020, 7:19 am

I'm still reading plenty but less than normal. My schedule is so different now with my two boys (age 10 and 7) home all day and needing help with their distance learning. Right now I'm reading two books that I'm very much enjoying, Inland by Tea Obreht and The Pioneers by David McCullough.

6baswood
mei 19, 2020, 8:42 am

The next book on my list is science fiction Robert A Heinlein Double Star

7BLBera
mei 19, 2020, 10:57 am

I'm also reading Wolf Hall. What an amazing book.

8thorold
mei 19, 2020, 11:16 am

Today I was able to return the library books I borrowed in early March! But I'm making such good progress with the TBR pile that I didn't try to borrow any new ones yet.

After yesterday's diversion into P.G. Wodehouse, I finished El ruido de las cosas al caer today, excellent, but maybe a slight disappointment after the more ambitious La forma de las ruinas which I read last year. I also read Alex La Guma's brilliant short novel of sixties Cape Town slum life, And a threefold cord today.

Now reading Yasunari Kawabata's Palm-of-the-hand stories, Zola's L'argent should be next.

On audio I'm listening to Every tool's a hammer, which is a bit disappointing so far, it seems to be more of a self-help book for project management than anything else ("Make lists! With checkboxes! Set yourself deadlines!...").

9dchaikin
Bewerkt: mei 19, 2020, 1:52 pm

>5 japaul22: I’m curious about The Pioneers. It might make a nice audiobook (and I’m looking for a new one)

I finished Glory, Nabokov’s 5th novel and easily my favorite so far. He looks at the young post-revolution Russian diaspora, which is interesting in itself. Next I plan to start Lanny by Max Porter as part of my Booker long list reading.

Also reading Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra, Dante’s Purgatorio (I’m on Canto X), and listening to The Dutch House by Ann Patchett (which is terrific, and it doesn’t hurt that it’s read by Tom Hanks)

10LadyoftheLodge
Bewerkt: mei 21, 2020, 1:57 pm

I have been reading a lot for NetGalley lately. I finished All About the Amish and Murder in the Wine Country. I am also reading for the various LT Challenges. Currently reading The Other Bennet Sister.

11japaul22
mei 19, 2020, 5:12 pm

>9 dchaikin: Dan, The Pioneers is nothing earth-shattering but I’m enjoying it. I always find McCullough’s writing interesting. I think it would work very well on audio.

12AnnieMod
mei 19, 2020, 11:18 pm

Reading The New Girl - the 19th and latest available Gabriel Allon book by Daniel Silva and my 8th of this series for 2020 (I did mention that I am working on catching up on series, didn't I)? :)

13lilisin
mei 20, 2020, 2:29 am

I've been reading the last 100 pages of two books for the past two weeks. I'm not quite sure what happened or where my reading mojo went but I'm insistent on finishing both books today so I can finally move on and maybe get back on the reading wave.

14rachbxl
mei 20, 2020, 3:13 am

It took me a while to find a way to make up for the reading that I normally do on the train to and from work, but now I've hit my stride (thanks in part to a new Kobo and 2 new sources of library e-books). I've noticed that I'm tending to read one book at a time at the moment, rather than having several on the go at once; I assume that's because I'm in one place all the time. I'm also doing A LOT of reading aloud to my 6-year old daughter. Last night I finished The Dutch House by Ann Patchett, which I enjoyed immensely, and I've now started Miss Iceland by Audur Ava Olafsdottir.

15ELiz_M
Bewerkt: jun 10, 2020, 7:06 am

I've been reading quite a bit of contemporary novels this month: All the Birds, Singing, American Spy, Severance, and The Memory Police, as well as the usual Anniversaries and an occasional chapter from The Golden Notebook.

16dchaikin
mei 20, 2020, 8:49 am

>11 japaul22: that doesn’t inspire me to rush our and get it 🙂

>14 rachbxl: have 2 hours left in The Dutch House and feel the same as you...just really enjoying it.

17tungsten_peerts
Bewerkt: jun 8, 2020, 1:13 pm

Dit bericht is door zijn auteur gewist.

18dchaikin
mei 20, 2020, 1:29 pm

>17 tungsten_peerts: I’ve never heard of The Book of Disquiet. Interesting. Noting. St Augustine references come in Dante here and there, but it hasn’t tempted me to read him.

19tungsten_peerts
Bewerkt: jun 8, 2020, 1:13 pm

Dit bericht is door zijn auteur gewist.

20lilisin
mei 20, 2020, 10:14 pm

>13 lilisin:

I didn't finish both books as promised but I still did well by finishing the last 50 pages of one (Jules Verne's Robur le conquerant) and then I read 50 pages of a new book, Drive your plow over the bones of the dead by Olga Tokarczuk which so far is wonderful. Loving the writing.

Today I'll finish the last 40 pages of my Chinese book Des balles et de l'opium during lunch so that finally I can note down that I have two books finished in May. Even though they were both short books and it's now the 21st already. Still don't know what happened to me this month.

21RidgewayGirl
mei 21, 2020, 1:56 pm

I'm reading a mystery novel set in Ghana, The Missing American by Kwei Quartey. The setting is the best part.

I'm also reading The Narcissism of Small Differences by Michael Zadoorian, which is about a couple living on the outskirts of Detroit, and I'm almost finished the superlatively good Herkunft by Saša Stanišic.

22AnnieMod
mei 21, 2020, 4:00 pm

Finished The New Girl last night (Silva did not disappoint even though it was weirder than usual).

And started Smoke Bitten - the latest in Briggs's Mercy Thompson series.

23dchaikin
mei 21, 2020, 10:06 pm

I finished The Dutch House today, on audio, and it is terrific and read perfectly by Tom Hanks. Not sure what I follow that up with.

24thorold
mei 22, 2020, 11:48 am

I've finished L'argent — only two more Zolas to go! It felt a bit light after monsters like La Terre and La bête humaine, rather like The way we live now, but with more sex...

Also finished listening to Every tool's a hammer — a bit too much like a management seminar for my taste, but probably more fun if you read it when you're fourteen.

I'm well into Cristo si è fermato a Eboli (read many years ago in translation, this is my first try in Italian) and I've started listening to Anne Enright's Actress.

25dchaikin
mei 22, 2020, 2:28 pm

>23 dchaikin: to follow up, I started Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line, on audio.

26avaland
Bewerkt: mei 22, 2020, 2:54 pm

Have picked up a reprint of an early Garry Disher novel, The Sunken Road, but am still plagued by a lack of quality reading time (for myself).

However, I have finished Barney Bipple's Magic Dandelions (and other books illustrated by Steven Kellogg), Walter the Farting Dog, I Need a New Butt, The Gruffalo and The Spiffiest Giant in Town.

27lisapeet
mei 22, 2020, 7:56 pm

I don't know if my reading can stack up against I Need a New Butt, but I did finish Becky Cooper's We Keep the Dead Close: A Murder at Harvard and Half a Century of Silence, the last of the four serious nonfiction books I was reading for work, and started something short, light, snappy, and a little delightfully bitchy: Madeleine St. John's The Women in Black, a book from 1993 that has recently been republished and seems to be having a bit of a renaissance (the Hilary Mantel blurb can't hurt).

28sallypursell
mei 22, 2020, 9:32 pm

>19 tungsten_peerts: My aunt was a nun, and took the name Augustine as her religious name. It was little odd to her her called "Augustine" by her peers. We just called her "Sister". She was a considerable role model for me. She was a hospital administrator with a master's degree Summa Cum Laude and ran a hospital in Kansas City Missouri during the terrible race riots there. I was so proud of her for letting in the protestors to shower and rest in the emergency department.

29sallypursell
mei 22, 2020, 9:37 pm

>25 dchaikin: Dan, are you listening more now? It sounds like it.

30tungsten_peerts
Bewerkt: jun 8, 2020, 1:13 pm

Dit bericht is door zijn auteur gewist.

31tungsten_peerts
Bewerkt: jun 8, 2020, 1:14 pm

Dit bericht is door zijn auteur gewist.

32thorold
mei 23, 2020, 11:07 am

>31 tungsten_peerts: Yes, I started with La fortune des Rougon in January 2018, and I’ve been reading them in order. I’d read maybe half of them before, but none in the last 20 years. I don’t think the order matters greatly, except the first and last books. Most of the time the only connection is that the main character is someone you met as a young child in an earlier book. Pot-bouille/Au bonheur des dames, L’Assommoir/Nana and La curée/L’argent are pairs that go together in order, but for the rest it doesn’t matter much.

33dchaikin
mei 23, 2020, 11:23 am

>29 sallypursell: yes, listening now. Just finished an hour walk while listening.

34dchaikin
mei 23, 2020, 12:45 pm

I should add I finished Lanny yesterday (we didn't mesh, different wavelengths, I think), and then started My Sister, the Serial Killer - which is my last book left from the 2019 Booker long list.

35tungsten_peerts
Bewerkt: jun 8, 2020, 1:14 pm

Dit bericht is door zijn auteur gewist.

36mabith
Bewerkt: mei 24, 2020, 4:14 pm

37lilisin
mei 25, 2020, 11:05 am

Finished Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead last night and quite enjoyed it although I need to think about it a little more. Now I'm 100 pages into Dead Man's Walk and really enjoying revisiting the characters of Lonesome Dove. DMW is not as deep (so far) as LD but I'm loving being back in Texas.

38LadyoftheLodge
mei 25, 2020, 11:16 am

I just finished Brighty of the Grand Canyon by Marguerite Henry. This was a story based on fact, about a burro in the Grand Canyon at the time when it was becoming a national monument. I loved the parts about Theodore Roosevelt. I visited the Grand Canyon several years ago and would love to go back there.

39thorold
mei 25, 2020, 12:18 pm

I've finished Cristo si è fermato a Eboli — just as good as it was the first time I read it! — and Portrait with keys : the city of Johannesburg unlocked, a kind of travel book with no actual travelling, by Ivan Vladislavić.

Still enjoying Anne Enright's Actress: a novel on audio.

I've started La bâtarde, which has been hanging around threateningly on my shelf for far too long.

40kidzdoc
mei 25, 2020, 3:01 pm

I finished two very good books this weekend, Mean by Myriam Gurba, and Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors and the Drug Company that Addicted America by Beth Macy. I'll start Beloved by Toni Morrison today, and get back to the poetry collection In the Language of My Captor by Shane McCrae.

41tungsten_peerts
Bewerkt: jun 8, 2020, 1:14 pm

Dit bericht is door zijn auteur gewist.

42LadyoftheLodge
mei 26, 2020, 2:59 pm

Currently reading Summer Darlings for NetGalley. Just finished The Crow's Call by Wanda Brunstetter.

43bragan
Bewerkt: mei 28, 2020, 4:48 pm

Recently finished: Futurama and Philosophy: Bite My Shiny Metal Axiom edited by Courtland Lewis (because I'm a sucker for stuff that combines pop culture and philosophy, even though it's seldom anywhere near as interesting as I hope it will be), Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman (which I really, really liked, once I got over not being sure how to feel about the protagonist and decided I was, in fact, extremely fond of her), and Love Among the Chickens by P.G. Wodehouse (which was good, sunny fun, as Wodehouse always is).

I'm now reading Sky Walking: An Astronaut's Memoir by Tom Jones, who made four space shuttle flights in the 90s.

44baswood
mei 28, 2020, 6:33 pm

My next books are
Angels and Insects by A S Byatt
Air Bridge hammond Innes

45sallypursell
Bewerkt: mei 28, 2020, 10:03 pm

>43 bragan: Have you read Makers or Down and Out In the Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow? Start out at his website; he often gives away books or makes them available online. I prefer Makers, and I bought a copy without even looking, because I want to support his work, and I know I will read this multiple times. That didn't disappoint me.

46sallypursell
mei 28, 2020, 10:08 pm

Today I read No One Noticed the Cat by Anne McCaffrey and The Canceled Czech by Lawrence Block, and I finished Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers, by Robert M. Sapolsky. The first was young adult fiction, the second one intrigue, and the third is Non-fiction, about the physiology of stress and coping, and stress-related diseases. They were all good in their way.

47thorold
Bewerkt: mei 29, 2020, 10:48 am

I finished Actress: a novel on audio, which I really enjoyed. Now listening to Mark Doty’s new book on Whitman, What is the grass? (one of about twenty books on Whitman with that title, it seems from the touchstone...).

Also finished La bâtarde yesterday, which turned out to be more fun than I’d been expecting, although neither haute couture nor black-market butchering is a subject I would actively look out for in a book...

A quick in-between read was Philip Callow’s Native ground — a chance find by a writer I should have known about but didn’t.

I’ve started Mein Name sei Gantenbein — Frisch is one of those writers I always feel a little bit intimidated by, I’m not sure why, so this is another one that’s been on the TBR forever.

48avaland
mei 29, 2020, 6:41 am

Having finished "The Cabin," another excellent, understated crime novel by Jørn Lier Horst, I now hope to start a volume of linked short stories: A Faithful but Melancholy Account of Several Barbarities Lately Committed by Jason Brown.

49RidgewayGirl
mei 29, 2020, 9:01 am

I'm very happy with the two crime novels I'm currently reading; The Wicked World, set in a down and out Los Angeles and written by Richard Lange, and A Lovely Way to Burn by Louise Welsh, in which a woman tries to find out why her boyfriend was murdered during a global pandemic.

I'm also reading Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid and The City We Became by N. K. Jemison for the Tournament of Books Summer Reading Challenge. I'm enjoying the second book a great deal more than the first.

50bragan
mei 29, 2020, 10:16 am

>45 sallypursell: I have read Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, although it was quite some time ago. Makers has been sitting on my TBR shelves for a while. One day, I will get to it!

51LadyoftheLodge
mei 29, 2020, 11:16 am

I just finished Summer Darlings for NetGalley and also read Ask the Astronaut by Tom Jones. I am currently reading The Jane Austen Society and a #1 Ladies Detective Agency book by Alexander McCall Smith.

52lisapeet
mei 29, 2020, 11:41 am

I finished The Women in Black pretty quickly—it's a short, charming read. I went in thinking this was going to be a bunch of women being catty to each other, and/or a funny-but-mournful study of how oppressive women's lives were—kind of a mid-century Aussie Dawn Powell. But it was actually none of that. Rather, it was sweet and funny and quite charming, lightweight but not dumb. And just the thing to read after four fairly serious nonfiction books in a row.

Now I'm rereading Iris Murdoch's Under the Net for a little impromptu book group of friends from Readerville.

53BLBera
mei 29, 2020, 9:01 pm

I think Under the Net was my first Murdoch. I should reread. I don't remember much about it except I loved her wit.

I am starting Old in Art School. Deborah recommended it and I think some others did as well.

54lisapeet
mei 29, 2020, 9:14 pm

>53 BLBera: I was probably one of those. I really enjoyed it—such an outside-the-box memoir, and really engaging. I interviewed her for Bloom a few years back, when the book first came out, and wished I could just hang out with her for a meal or an afternoon.

55LadyoftheLodge
mei 30, 2020, 1:31 pm

>53 BLBera: I have Old in Art School and it has been on my TBR list for ages. I am trying to save it for October Non-Fiction CAT since the topic will be The Arts. I am wondering if her experience will be anything like mine, as I earned my MLS after I already had my M.S. and Ph.D. and I was often the oldest grad student in the class. It was sometimes a very strange experience. I wish I could just talk with Nell Painter and compare notes.

56lisapeet
mei 30, 2020, 1:51 pm

>55 LadyoftheLodge: I was at least one of the three oldest folks getting my MLS... it was an interesting experience. That was one of the reasons I wanted to interview her.

57BLBera
mei 30, 2020, 2:01 pm

>54 lisapeet: I would love to hang out with her, Lisa. I am really enjoying it so far.

58rachbxl
mei 31, 2020, 4:12 am

I am enthralled by The Shadow King by Maaza Mengiste. A gripping story, but really it’s the writing - exquisite. And for light relief (if a novel about a serial killer can be called that), I am enthralled in a different way by Jo Nesbo’s Police.

59lilisin
mei 31, 2020, 6:20 am

I finished Larry McMurtry's Dead Man's Walk, the pre-prequel to Lonesome Dove, as my last book of the month. Loved reunited with these characters and enjoying the adventure.

60thorold
mei 31, 2020, 9:18 am

I finished Mein Name sei Gantenbein yesterday (interesting, but didn't really bowl me over), and completed my read-through of Christine Brooke-Rose with her last novel, Subscript, a ludicrously ambitious idea that sort-of works. Although there was something that made me keep wondering when Raquel Welch was going to come on in a brontosaurus-fur bikini...

Now reading Pilgrimage 4. After that, I think it will be time to attack one of the Bessie Head books the postman brought me the other day.

61rocketjk
mei 31, 2020, 1:51 pm

I finished the excellent I finished The Republic: The Fight for Irish Independence, 1918-1923 by Charles Townshend. I read this as a follow up to Townshend's Easter 1916: The Irish Rebellion. The two books were recommended to me, along with Tom Barry's Guerilla Days in Ireland, by a bookseller in a great store in Cork City when my wife and I were there on vacation a few years back. I had asked him about the best books to read to learn about the events of those years. You can see my review on the book's work page or on my personal CR thread.

I've now started Fever Dream, a short novel by Argentinian author Samanta Schweblin.

62LadyoftheLodge
mei 31, 2020, 4:17 pm

I just finished The Jane Austen Society which I loved. I am going to have to go back to re-read Austen now! I am just starting The Rural Diaries but now sure how much I will like it, as parts of it annoy me already.

63Cariola
jun 1, 2020, 6:01 pm

I finished The Book of Longings a few days ago. Meh. Just got started on Julian Barnes' latest, The Man in the Red Coat

64bragan
jun 1, 2020, 7:08 pm

Just finished All Systems Red by Martha Wells, which was just as much fun as everyone says. I'm now reading Brief Cases by Jim Butcher, a collection of short stories set in the universe of his Dresden Files series.

65dchaikin
Bewerkt: jun 2, 2020, 12:41 am

Finished My Sister, the Serial Killer, which was good fun. I've started a short Nabokov biography, Vladimir Nabokov (Overlook Illustrated Lives) by Jane Grayson, and I've cracked open Love's Labour's Lost for my Shakespeare group. Dante is moving along...

66jjmcgaffey
jun 2, 2020, 12:01 am

I just finished (at 3 am...) Faith in the Service by M.C.A. Hogarth. It's as fantastic as most of hers; the last (so far) of the Alysha Forrest books, and it links hard back to the prequel, Alysha's Fall. Dead ends and disaster get turned into a way of moving forward, and letting go of old secrets. Magnificent. I need to _not_ read any more of hers for a while, because my stash is getting low - I can read faster than she can write...

67thorold
jun 2, 2020, 9:36 am

I finished Pilgrimage 4, which completes one of my big projects for 2020! A wonderful and important book I wish I’d known about a long time ago, but better late than never...

Also finished listening to What is the grass , so I’ll have to pick another audiobook. It might prompt me to go and dig out some more Whitman-related stuff, not sure yet.

I’ve started Bessie Head’s When rain clouds gather / Maru, which come in a slightly less intimidating Virago omnibus than the four volumes of Pilgrimage.

68LadyoftheLodge
jun 2, 2020, 2:59 pm

I finished The Rural Diaries and am currently reading Marshmallow Malice and a #1 Ladies Detective Agency book.

69kidzdoc
jun 2, 2020, 3:31 pm

I've just started reading How to Be an Antiracist by Professor Ibram X. Kendi of American University. I'm also working on Journey to Portugal: In Pursuit of Portugal's History and Culture by José Saramago, and Beloved by Toni Morrison.

70baswood
jun 2, 2020, 4:58 pm

I have Just started Le Hussard sur le Toit by Jean Giono - this one has been on my reading list for some time, but I have been hesitating because it's about the plague, a different kind of plague: a cholera epidemic

I am also reading Air Bridge by Hammond Innes which is based around the Berlin Airlift something of which I know nothing about.

Both books were published in 1951, my favourite year this year.

71japaul22
jun 2, 2020, 6:43 pm

I'm reading Visionary Women: How Rachel Carson, Jane Jacobs, Jane Goodall, and Alice Waters Changed our World which is off to a fantastic start.

Also finishing up Sharon Kay Penman's newest historical fiction set in 1100s Jerusalem, The Land Beyond the Sea.

72rocketjk
jun 3, 2020, 1:19 pm

I raced through Samanta Schweblin's short but powerful novel Fever Dream. You can find my thoughts about the book on my personal CR thread.

Missing baseball as I do, I've begun reading, and enjoying, The Only Rule Is It Has to Work: Our Wild Experiment Building a New Kind of Baseball Team by Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller. Two young sports writers and statistics nerds were given a chance to assemble and run an independent league baseball team in Sonoma, California in 2015, which is actually quite close to me. This book is there account of the experience. It's very entertainingly written, but it is for baseball fans only.

73LadyoftheLodge
jun 3, 2020, 2:37 pm

I read three books for NetGalley:
Marshmallow Malice by Amanda Flower
A Simple Wedding by Leigh Duncan
Read or Alive by Nora Page

74AlisonY
jun 4, 2020, 9:44 am

I've finished Book 6 of My Struggle by Knausgaard, which ends the series for me. Cue deep book depression.

75BLBera
jun 4, 2020, 11:09 am

I'm finishing Old in Art School and starting The Overstory.

76thorold
jun 4, 2020, 11:16 am

I enjoyed Bessie Head’s When rain clouds gather / Maru, I've still got a couple more of hers on the TBR...

Read Martin Suter's Ein perfekter Freund, which turned out to be an OK sort of thriller, probably more the sort of thing to read when trapped in a holiday cottage in the rain than at home with 90+ books on the TBR, though.

I think I'll tackle Hugh Thomas's Rivers of gold next. Not the longest book on the TBR, but definitely the thickest.

I've started listening to The Diary of a Bookseller, which is nicely charming and mindless, but makes me want to go to Scotland...

77dchaikin
jun 4, 2020, 1:14 pm

Finished my audiobook, Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line, which was ok. Last night I got into a lot of trouble choosing the next audiobook. Went through numerous samples and rejected them all. But this morning I was still thinking of the sample of Siri Hustvedt’s Memories of the Future, which came out last year. So I started it this morning... so far it’s terrific.

78thorold
jun 4, 2020, 1:43 pm

>77 dchaikin: I really liked Memories of the Future (read as e-book), I'm sure it would work very well on audio with a good reader.

79LadyoftheLodge
Bewerkt: jun 4, 2020, 1:59 pm

I read Seadogs: An Epic Ocean Operetta by Lisa Wheeler for RandomCAT, and also One Summer Up North by John Owens, which is a picture book about the Boundary Waters for NetGalley. Currently reading You Bet Your Life by Donald Bain and also a #1 Ladies Detective Agency book.

80AlisonY
jun 5, 2020, 8:45 am

81dchaikin
jun 5, 2020, 1:33 pm

>78 thorold: the reader is terrific, which is part of why it stuck. I have to be careful though. The book rewards close reading, while inspiring a lot of absent minded exploration of themes. I find myself having missed a few minutes and then when I rewind the book to last point I remember, that last line will turn out to be the root whatever I drifted off thinking.

82thorold
jun 5, 2020, 3:40 pm

>81 dchaikin: Yes, I know the feeling. But it happens with paper books as well: you find you’ve read a couple of paragraphs whilst thinking about something else, look back and realise what it was that made you think of that, and so on until you can break out of the loop...

83LadyoftheLodge
jun 6, 2020, 1:52 pm

I just finished To the Land of Long Lost Friends by Alexander McCall Smith. This was my newest selection in the "1 Ladies Detective Agency series (#20). I have read every one of them so far. I found this one to be a bit of a disappointment, as it moved much more slowly and included a lot of philosophizing and not much action. The book included some interesting set-ups for the next one in the series though.

I am still reading You Bet Your Life by Donald Bain, but getting tired of it so will probably skip and skim.

84LadyoftheLodge
jun 7, 2020, 11:44 am

I finished the AlphaKIT selections for Category Challenge June as follows:
Christmas at Hard Cider Abbey: A Novelette by K.P. Cecala--A short little book about a baby that is left on the doorstep of the abbey on Christmas and how the young monks deal with him.

Murder She Wrote: You Bet Your Life by Donald Bain--Not the best I ever read in the series, long on courtroom drama and legal aspects of a murder case set in Las Vegas.

85AlisonY
jun 7, 2020, 4:40 pm

I finished The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, and am on next to The Dutch House, which I caught so many BBs on from various CR threads.

86LadyoftheLodge
jun 7, 2020, 5:29 pm

I finished Imagined London by Anna Quindlen for TravelKIT June. This book sounded great, with lots of promise, but turned out to be singularly dull reading. This will go off my bookshelves, although I think I must have read it sometime in the past. It was supposed to be about London and its many faces and how it was mentioned in literature. Just too slow and uninteresting for me right now. Also counts for "journalism" square on my BingoDOG Card #2.

87baswood
jun 7, 2020, 7:12 pm

Back to 1951 for me and Philip Wylie's The Disappearance, Philip Wylie

88thorold
jun 8, 2020, 3:43 am

I'm about halfway through Hugh Thomas's Rivers of gold, which is predictably good, and fills in a few gaps in my knowledge of Spanish history. Nearly finished listening to The Diary of a Bookseller, I think The Dutch house will be next on audio (if you can't beat 'em...).

Finished Chaka and Down Second Avenue for the Southern Africa theme, both really good.

I think I might allow myself another detective story on the way back to the Spanish Main, or possibly another Bessie Head from the TBR pile...

89rocketjk
jun 9, 2020, 1:48 pm

I finished The Only Rule Is It Has to Work: Our Wild Experiment Building a New Kind of Baseball Team by Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller. It is a very well written co-memoir about baseball and human nature as seen through the prism of two writers/bloggers given a chance to apply sabermatrics theory in running a very low level independent league baseball team during the summer of 2015. In any part of that makes sense and/or is of interest to you, I recommend the book. You'll find more on my own CR thread or on the book's work page.

Next up for me will be the novel Bad Guy by pop art icon Rosalyn Drexler.

90dchaikin
jun 9, 2020, 10:31 pm

I finished the Nabokov biography, which was brief and well done (Vladimir Nabokov (Overlook Illustrated Lives) by Jane Grayson), and I started Nabokov's 1933 novel, which he translated as Laughter in the Dark (His Russian title translates to Camera Obscura). It starts out, "Once upon a time there was..."

91lilisin
jun 10, 2020, 3:46 am

Finishing Ursula K Le Guin's The Dispossessed today but not sure what I'll pick up next.

92ELiz_M
jun 10, 2020, 7:10 am

I mis-read The Graduate, finished Weather and Speaking of Summer and am slogging through The Living and the Dead.

Anniversaries continues and I need to finish The Golden Notebook. Oh and I may also be reading Love's Labor Lost.

93rachbxl
jun 10, 2020, 8:25 am

I'm really enjoying The Butterfly Girl by Rene Denfeld, a library e-book about which I knew nothing. I'm also reading Lauren Groff's Fates and Furies, though I'm not sure what to make of it yet.

94LadyoftheLodge
jun 10, 2020, 1:09 pm

I finished The Trustworthy One by Shelley Shepard Gray and I am now reading The Summer Villa by Melissa Hill, which I am not liking so far. Too much jumping backward and forward in time and between characters, which is confusing to me.

95AnnieMod
jun 10, 2020, 3:43 pm

After some almost frantic reading in the last months (ahem...), I had been mostly reading magazines and newspapers in the last 2 weeks... and not the literary type of magazines.

So last night I finally decided that enough is enough and picked up an actual book - Modern African Drama - one of Norton Critical Editions compilations. I am not sure if I will read the essays around the plays or just the plays yet (I am in no mood to be told what "the author wanted to say" but on the other hand, the historical context is important in some cases). I plan to post about each of the plays individually though.

And I plan to return to reading more plays again, including rereading some of the ones I raced through last summer.

96AnnieMod
jun 10, 2020, 4:09 pm

>90 dchaikin:

You made me look up the Russian text -- he uses an interesting verb tense (Жил был некогда) in that sentence - one that usually is used as an opener for fairy tales (thus the translation) but that can have slightly different connotations outside of fairy tales - allegories and "nope, don't censor this, it is just a tale" often open that way as well. :) I had not read that one so not sure what Nabokov intended but this did make me curious. I will be interested to see what you think about the book .

97lilisin
Bewerkt: jun 14, 2020, 9:59 pm

I decided to pick up Evelyn Waugh's The Loved One but the writing and style of book is so completely different from the science fiction that I just read that I feel like I've just given myself reader's whiplash. I'm going to need at least 50 pages to get into this book I feel and it's only 150 pages long (with illustrations!).

98lisapeet
jun 11, 2020, 8:28 am

I really enjoyed my reread of Iris Murdoch's Under the Net for our Iris Murdoch Fan Girls Zoom book club—more on that in my thread if anyone's interested. And now because I'm a slave to buzz, I guess, I'm reading N.K. Jemisin's The City We Became

99dchaikin
jun 11, 2020, 9:34 am

>96 AnnieMod: thanks for that insight. Really interesting in context. I’m getting a sense I’m missing half the art in translation...even if it’s his own translation.

100LadyoftheLodge
jun 11, 2020, 11:22 am

I finished skimming The Summer Villa, which tells the story of friendship among three women over time. The thread tying them together is the villa in Italy where they first met. The action alternates between "then" and "now" which I found somewhat confusing. The characters are interesting and described well, with their quite contrasting personalities. The ending wraps things up nicely, for a fun and light beach read, if you like that kind of chicklit novel. Being as I am not from Ireland, I found some of the slang terms used by the Irish gal confusing.

101bragan
jun 12, 2020, 3:51 am

I've recently finished On the Origin of Stories: Evolution, Cognition, and Fiction by Brian Boyd, which was worth reading, but not nearly as interesting and thought-provoking as I'd hoped, and am now reading This Census-Taker by China Miéville. Nearly halfway through that one now and I still have no idea what to make of it.

102thorold
jun 12, 2020, 9:37 am

I finished Rivers of gold and (on audio) Diary of a bookseller. In the last few days I've also read the Bessie Head short-story collection The lovers, Dervla Murphy's South African travel book South from the Limpopo, and Sarah Caudwell's comic legal mystery story Thus was Adonis murdered.

I've started The Dutch House on audio and the old East German classic Ole Bienkopp on paper.

103dchaikin
jun 12, 2020, 10:08 am

>101 bragan: Interesting to me because Brian Boyd is author of what seems to be generally the most highly regarded biography of Nabokov. There’s a good chance I’ll read it as I read through Nabokov.

104BLBera
jun 12, 2020, 12:48 pm

I just finished The Overstory, wonderful, and look forward to my book club discussion today.

Next is Writers & Lovers.

105bragan
jun 13, 2020, 6:07 am

>103 dchaikin: Yes, the author bio did say he was probably the world's foremost expert on Nabokov, or words to that effect. Interestingly, I don't remember if he even mentions Nabokov at all in this book. If he does, it's probably only in passing.

Meanwhile, I've diverted myself briefly with I Will Judge You By Your Bookshelf, a pleasant little collection of bookish comics by Grant Snider, and am now trying to psyche myself up to dig into Secrets of the Lighthouse by Santa Montefiore. Which appears to be some sort of love story, and, oh dear, didn't I just recently get done saying how often those fail to work for me in the Questions thread? But it was one of my SantaThing books from last year, and I'm feeling guilty that the year is nearly half over and I haven't read any of those yet.

106baswood
jun 13, 2020, 11:15 am

I am reading The Loved and the lost, Morley Callaghan by Morley Callaghan. It is a novel from my 1951 booklist. I know nothing about Morley Callaghan but you Canadians will be able to tell me if he is worth reading.

107LadyoftheLodge
jun 13, 2020, 12:27 pm

I just finished Mums and Mayhem which is a cozy mystery by Amanda Flower. I am reading Crossing Over by Ruth Irene Garrett, which is the story of how a woman left the Amish to marry an Englischer. Also reading Little Bookshop of Murder.

108rocketjk
jun 13, 2020, 12:51 pm

I finished Bad Guy, a sly, very dark comedy from 1982 about a psychologist treating a young man who has committed a brutal rape and murder of an old woman and the woman's adult daughter. The novel is by artist/writer/wrestler Rosalyn Drexler. You'll find my more in-depth comments about the book, and info about Drexler's fascinating life, on my own CR thread or the book's main page.

Next up for me will be The Swordsman of Mars by Otis Adelbert Kline. Hey, they can't all be classics!

109RidgewayGirl
jun 13, 2020, 1:24 pm

I got my first physical book from the library since March - they've opened up so that you can pick up requested books at the entrance, and I'm enjoying it so far. In West Mills by De'Shawn Charles Winslow is set in a small town in North Carolina during WWII.

I'm also reading The Margot Affair by Sanaë Lemoine, about a teenage daughter whose father is a prominent politician who has another family. It's just so French in how it tells the story, which is to say it would play out very differently in the US.

110lisapeet
jun 14, 2020, 11:38 am

Ditched The City We Became. By all accounts this should have been up my alley—NYC-centric, a vaguely punk vibe, good vs. evil—but the lack of character development and nonstop manic pacing just didn't work for me. Very cool idea, though.

111thorold
jun 14, 2020, 12:26 pm

Ole Bienkopp turned out to be much more fun than a 1960s saga of collective farms and plan targets has any right to be. After that I gave in to the temptation to read another of Sarah Caudwell's legal mysteries, The shortest way to Hades, which was also fun, of course, but in a much more capitalist and imperialist kind of way!

I've just started Nadine Gordimer's story collection Beethoven was one-sixteenth black.

112lilisin
jun 14, 2020, 9:59 pm

I finished The Loved One which I wonder who would want (lot's of w's there) to read it these days. Not too sure I actually enjoyed the book. Kind of feels on par with The Great Gatsby.

This morning I stared War of the Worlds by HG Wells because I need fast paced adventure style reading and all my other books are very dark and intellectual. Or if they are adventure based they are super long.

113BLBera
jun 15, 2020, 10:07 am

I finished -- and loved -- Writers & Lovers and am starting Vacationland for my family book discussion.

114AnnieMod
Bewerkt: jun 15, 2020, 2:18 pm

Finished 3 books in the last few days: a memoir of Rwanda from before the wars (The Barefoot Woman by Scholastique Mukasonga) and two novels: Made in Saturn by Rita Indiana (which was a bit weird) and Ghost Money, the fifth Eric Carter novel, which was exactly what one would expect from this series). Reviews in my thread and on their own pages.

Reading two books at the moment: After the Ice: A Global Human History, 20,000–5000 BC (back to my old project to read through human history in order (last time I went in the wrong direction and got stuck into Earth formation and similar topics so let's see what happens this time) and on the fiction side: The Shadow King by Maaza Mengiste, a historical novel set in Ethiopia.

I am also reading some plays (a play a day at the moment actually) - will write about them later though.

115thorold
jun 16, 2020, 8:39 am

I finished the Nadine Gordimer stories, which were fun, also another Unity Dow novel, The screaming of the innocent, and I finished listening to Ann Patchett's Anne Tyler pastiche, The Dutch house.

Now reading La Débâcle and listening to Anne Enright's (— why are all novelists these days called Anne? —) The Forgotten Waltz.

116dchaikin
jun 16, 2020, 12:35 pm

>115 thorold: Anne Tyler pastiche? Hmm. I just bought my 1st Anne Tyler Sunday.

117thorold
jun 16, 2020, 12:48 pm

>116 dchaikin: I was half-joking, but you’ll probably see what I mean.

>115 thorold: Since I posted that, the postman’s been, and I got sucked into starting another one, ...und Du, Frau an der Werkbank, a study of representations of working women in the DDR in the fifties. One of those books that look as though there is no possible sane reason for anybody wanting to read them, and are consequently irresistible when you see them on ABEbooks. :-)

118LadyoftheLodge
Bewerkt: jun 18, 2020, 11:34 am

I finished Little Bookshop of Murder which was disappointing, despite its potential. I am still reading Crossing Over: One Woman's Escape from Amish Life.

119baswood
Bewerkt: jun 16, 2020, 6:03 pm

Another book from the 1951 pile and its The Grass Harp by Truman Capote

120AnnieMod
jun 17, 2020, 1:32 am

If anyone is interested, I am posting about plays (reading them and listening to some... no immediate plans to actually see one but who knows) in a new thread: https://www.librarything.com/topic/321483 and everyone is welcome to stop by :)

The old thread will remain for all other reading; the new one is for my "a play a day" project :) I am 2 days behind on reviews but just posted the first 5 so the rest will be tomorrow. I probably won't mention plays in this thread too often unless something really impresses me or when I finish a long anthology.

121AlisonY
jun 17, 2020, 4:02 am

I finished the rather underwhelming The Dutch House, and have moved onto David Foster Wallace's A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again.

122ELiz_M
jun 17, 2020, 8:03 am

>121 AlisonY: I loved that DFW collection. I made a point of searching out his essay on cruises before my first-ever cruise experience.

123AlisonY
jun 17, 2020, 8:06 am

>122 ELiz_M: I haven't got to that bit yet, but assuming that he found cruising abhorrent did it not put you off?!!

124rachbxl
jun 17, 2020, 8:19 am

>116 dchaikin: Which Anne Tyler did you buy, Dan?

I'm enjoying Téa Obreht's Inland, and I'm also reading an Amélie Nothomb, though I can't remember which. My library hold on The Sacrament by Olaf Olafsson just came through, and I can't wait to start it.

125dchaikin
jun 17, 2020, 11:41 am

>124 rachbxl: i was at a Barnes and Noble and there were lots of options. I wasn’t sure they would have any, because their fiction choices have slimmed down a lot. Anyway, I bought Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant. I expect to start it today or tomorrow.

126rocketjk
jun 17, 2020, 2:20 pm

I finished some escapist fun, The Swordsman of Mars by Otis Adelbert Kline, originally published in 1933. As you might imagine, this old science fiction story puts the test to a modern reader's willing suspension of disbelief. You can read my just a bit longer comments on my personal CR thread.

Well, so much for escapism, at least for now. Next up for me is Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Amy Goldstein's Janesville: An American Story, an account of life in Janesville, Wisconsin, after the closing of the GM plant.

127LadyoftheLodge
jun 18, 2020, 11:34 am

Completed Crossing Over: One Woman's Escape from Amish Life which was a 3-star read. I had this on my TBR list for ages, maybe because there are many Amish communities in Indiana. It was somewhat disappointing and I had a hard time staying engaged.

128BLBera
jun 18, 2020, 11:58 am

Just started Anne Tyler's new one, Redhead by the Side of the Road.

129LadyoftheLodge
Bewerkt: jun 19, 2020, 1:23 pm

Finished Her Amish Suitor's Secret and Stracciatella Gelato: Melting Time both for NetGalley. Just starting A Heartwarming Romance Collection by Wanda Brunstetter (no touchstone yet).

130AnnieMod
Bewerkt: jun 18, 2020, 6:15 pm

I finished The Shadow King by Maaza Mengiste last night (historical novel set in Ethiopia and covering most of the late 1930s and the Italo-Ethopian war but managing to cover a lot more besides that) - which was very good although it was a bit too wordy in places. Review and so on posted. :)

And started Alone in the Classroom by Elizabeth Hay. Before last night I could have sworn I had never heard of this book or this author but apparently I bought it in 2013 (found the record for the purchase) -- I kinda stumbled on it in the middle of a pile of books I was checking while searching for another one.

131dchaikin
jun 20, 2020, 2:56 pm

My currently reading pile expanded a bit. I finished Laughter in the Dark, the best Nabokov so are, with fascinating echoes of Anna Karenina (although I didn't pick up on those myself. I read about them afterward). And I've started Over by the River a 1970's short story collection by William Maxwell, who I have never read before. I'm reading a story a week. And, although I promised to start the Anne Tyler, my daughter brought me Dune and told me she had just finished. So, I've started that.

(others on going are Dante, Shakespeares Love's Labour's Lost at an act a week, and, on audio, I'm near finished with the terrific Memories of the Future by Siri Hustvedt. If Hustved knew her title is the fifth option in the touchstones list, and that the previous four are all books by men, she might have something very interesting to say about it.)

132baswood
jun 20, 2020, 5:02 pm

My next book is Against a Dark Background science fiction by Iain M Banks

133japaul22
jun 20, 2020, 7:06 pm

I'm trying to get through a stack of library books that I was finally able to get my hands on and now need to finish before they need to be returned. I'm currently reading Mary Toft; or, the Rabbit Queen. I just finished the very creepy I Remember You, an Icelandic ghost story. And I have The Long, Bright River on my kindle.

I also have Mirror, Shoulder, Signal and Visitation by Jenny Erpenbeck. Not sure I can get to them all before July 3 . . .

134lisapeet
jun 20, 2020, 7:16 pm

Just finished up Bryan Washington's Lot, a 100% random pick, which was a great collection—just what I was in the mood for, a vivid and affecting window onto a place and population I wasn't well acquainted with before. While I read fiction for many reasons, one of them is to visit lives unlike my own—when it's done well it's like traveling, eye-opening and engaging. Washington's writing swings from rough to smooth, bluff to sweet (but never maudlin, no matter how harsh a picture he's painting), with a great dose of compassion floating beneath the surface at all times. Very good work—unpredictable, satisfying, kind.

My real life book club has decided to go ahead with a Zoom meeting in a couple of weeks, so I guess I'll go back to the bell hooks (All About Love) that we had planned to talk about when Covid hit—though I wasn't super feeling it when I started it back in March. That might be a result of my expectations, but it feels heavy handed to me… maybe I'll have a fresh take on it now. I think I'm about halfway through.

135AnnieMod
jun 20, 2020, 11:42 pm

Finished Alone in the Classroom - which had some great parts but failed as a whole novel - but introduced me to a new author whose style I like. Review in my thread and in the work.

Started Cane -- Jean Toomer's classic book (I am not sure this counts as a novel but it is not a collection either - "Scenes of" is probably the best way to call it) - BBC Radio 4 just ran a new dramatization of it so I figured it may be a good idea to check the original before I listen to it. It is.. weird - but it has that hypnotic style of the old legends which somehow seems to make it work so far - so we will see.

136ELiz_M
jun 21, 2020, 7:09 am

Finally finished The Living and the Dead. I've also read Good Talk and Citizen: An American Lyric. I need to get back to The Golden Notebook and, as always, am reading Anniversaries.

137avaland
jun 21, 2020, 8:16 am

Reading an excellent literary crime novel, Norwegian by Night by Derek Miller mostly in the evenings or very early mornings before the sun is over the trees, and trying to get to back to a collection of linked short stories A Faithful but Melancholy Account of Several Barbarities Lately Committed by Jason Brown, which I expect to be as good as the author's first collection, but other 'stuff' gets in the way. Plus, it's been a bit too hot and humid to laze about on the deck or one of the porches to read.

138thorold
Bewerkt: jun 21, 2020, 2:59 pm

...und Du, Frau an der Werkbank was interesting, definitely more DDR stuff coming up.

I finished three more for the South Africa theme: the 1930 novel Mhudi by the prominent black leader Sol Plaatje; Herman Charles Bosman's prison memoir Cold stone jug; and a silly pre-Boer war propaganda novel, Prinsloo of Prinsloosdorp.

Other than that I'm about halfway through La Débâcle, taking it slowly.

Also finished The forgotten waltz on audio — I'm becoming an Enright fan, I think — and I've got The Madonna of Excelsior by Zakes Mda lined up next.

>133 japaul22: Mirror, Shoulder, Signal and Visitation are both books I really enjoyed a few years ago — I hope you do too!

139bragan
jun 22, 2020, 10:48 am

I'm reading The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander. I've had this one sitting on the TBR shelves for quite some time, but now seemed like very much the moment to finally start reading it. And, indeed, it is, but while the book is good, the subject matter is so depressing and infuriating that I sometimes have to prod myself into picking it up again.

140AnnieMod
jun 22, 2020, 12:33 pm

Finished Cane which was... interesting. I liked it more than I expected but it is definitely not my style.

And I am in the middle of a few long anthologies:

True Crime: An American Anthology which is better when read in small doses so I am slowly making my way through it.

American Antislavery Writings: Colonial Beginnings to Emancipation which is one of those cases where I started reading a different book and somehow ended up with this one. I picked up Reconstruction: Voices from America's First Great Struggle for Racial Equality first. After reading the introduction, I realized that it is essentially a continuation of the 4-volume The Civil War: Told By Those Who Lived It series - even if it can be read on its own, it starts where the series finishes. So back I went to the first volume. And after reading the introduction, I realized I need some more background - even if I can start with the Civil War, most of those writers and opinions had been working earlier. So back to the Antislavery Writings I went while looking for some history books on the times before the War. So another one of my (small-ish) reading projects is underway.

Plus working on my World History project and the Plays/drama one. And reading a lot of magazines and newspapers - which I may decide to start writing about again (or at least the parts which impress me one way or another).

I suspect that before I finish either of those books, I will finish a few more (or a lot more) others -- both fiction and non-fiction. I may go to thrillers and SF for awhile but who knows :)

141lilisin
jun 22, 2020, 7:56 pm

I finished the horrific (in subject matter) war memoir My Hitch in Hell: The Bataan Death March. Was very good.

142LadyoftheLodge
jun 23, 2020, 1:38 pm

I finished A Heartwarming Romance Collection (short stories) by Wanda Brunstetter for NetGalley, due to publish in a few days. The stories were just a lot of fun and had an overt Christian message that is integral to the storyline. I am now reading A Fatal Fiction by Kaitlyn Dunnett--sort of hard to get into at first, but better now that I am half way through. I have not guessed the perp yet.

143rocketjk
Bewerkt: jun 25, 2020, 11:50 am

I finished Janesville: An American Story by Amy Goldstein. This is a well researched and extremely readable book about life in Janesville, Wisconsin, from 2008 through 2013, in the years following the closure of what had been the longest-running GM plant in the country. Literally generations of Janesville residents had made their livings from the plant and the many manufacturing companies that existed to supply parts to the cars built there. Interestingly, Janesville is also the hometown of Paul Ryan, Republican champion of governmental austerity and former Speaker of the House, a somewhat ironic fact given how solidly Democratic and pro-union the town has always been.

Janesville is an extremely valuable resource for understanding the economic and cultural issues besetting so much of American society today. You can see my more in-depth review on the book's work page or on my own CR thread.

Next up for me is Trailblazer: A Pioneering Journalist's Fight to Make the Media Look More like America by Dorothy Butler Gilliam. Gilliam, when she was hired in 1961, became the first Black woman reporter at the Washington Post. The book is her memoir of those times.

144RidgewayGirl
jun 24, 2020, 5:54 pm

I just finished Sharks in the Time of Saviors by Kawai Strong Washburn, which was excellent.

I'm currently in the middle of The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead, which is hard to read, but very good and The Blood of Heaven by Kent Wascom, about the attempt to establish the country of West Florida in the early 1800s, which is violent and entertaining.

And I've just started The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich and Ducks, Newburyport by Lucy Ullmann, the second because it was a gift from my daughter, who keeps asking me if I'm reading it yet.

145thorold
jun 25, 2020, 4:39 am

I finished La Débâcle a couple of days ago, a great experience, as usual with Zola. Only one left now!

Also finished another South African book, Mating birds by Lewis Nkosi. Currently reading The puritans in Africa by W A De Klerk, which is alternately frustrating and fascinating. I've also started trying to read Die Swerfjare van Poppie Nongena in Afrikaans — rather sad to see that Elsa Joubert died a few days ago, from COVID-related illness.

Still listening to The Madonna of Excelsior by Zakes Mda — it turns out to have a plot oddly complementary to that of Mating birds...

146BLBera
jun 26, 2020, 9:18 am

I'm reading The Turtle Catcher, a historical novel set in Minnesota just after WWI.

147LadyoftheLodge
jun 26, 2020, 1:23 pm

I finished A Fatal Fiction (cozy mystery, 3 stars for stupidity on the part of the main character) and now I am reading Amish Generations which us a series of short stories.

148AnnieMod
jun 26, 2020, 2:54 pm

Finished Watershed by Doreen Vanderstoop last night (climate dystopia, debut novel, needs polish but readable despite issues). Next on the fiction side is Jakarta by Rodrigo Márquez Tizano.

149lisapeet
jun 27, 2020, 3:22 pm

Still trudging through All About Love—if it weren't for a book club, and if I didn't have a few points that I'm interested in discussing, I would have put it aside already. I'm not sure I'll finish it, but I'll see how far I get by our meeting on Thursday.

And because everyone loves a little light entertainment, I'm currently reading The Great Influenza: The Epic Story of the Deadliest Plague in History.

150lilisin
jun 29, 2020, 3:04 am

I purchased and read this weekend the famous Night by Elie Wiesel. Objectively the other war memoir I read this month was better but I agree that this is a good book to teach at the middle school level for a WWII course as they can get the perspective of a 14 year old, which is close in age.

151avaland
jun 29, 2020, 8:44 am

>149 lisapeet: I'll be interested in your review of the Influenza book. Some years ago, maybe 2007/8, I read John Illife's book on the origin of Aids, and also two or three books on tuberculosis. The first was read because I read his history of Africa, the latter because I was potentially going to use TB in a project I was working on (turned out, I didn't)

152lisapeet
jun 29, 2020, 1:37 pm

>151 avaland: Will do. So far I'm finding it very readable—he's working like a good historian and providing a lot of background, first off on the history of medicine and medical education in the 19th c., which I always like. But I'm only about 60 pages in so I'll let you know if he keeps it up.

153BLBera
jun 29, 2020, 3:34 pm

I just finished a good historical novel, The Turtle Catcher and will start Hid from Our Eyes, a mystery.

154baswood
jun 29, 2020, 6:06 pm

I am reading Edward the Second by Christopher Marlowe

155AlisonY
jun 30, 2020, 7:38 am

I wasn't in the mood for the David Foster Wallace essays in the end. They're too good to rush through, but I'm not in the reading mood for something requiring such close attention.

I've moved onto Howard Jacobson's Live a Little, which isn't overly grabbing me.

156thorold
jun 30, 2020, 11:01 am

I realised that the end of the quarter was coming up and I only had one Zola novel left, so I put a couple of other things aside to finish Le Docteur Pascal. Inevitable feelings of anticlimax, but I'm sure another project will come along soon...

Otherwise, I've still got Die Swerfjare van Poppie Nongena on the go, and I've started Tim Blanning's Frederick the Great.

On audio, I finished The Madonna of Excelsior and started listening to The bell jar, a book I haven't read since I was about 17.

157LadyoftheLodge
jun 30, 2020, 4:02 pm

I am reading Never an Amish Bride for NetGalley.

158BLBera
jul 1, 2020, 12:28 pm

I am reading Bring up the Bodies

159ELiz_M
jul 1, 2020, 7:57 pm

I am starting Lost Children Archive soon and following it with Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay in Forty Questions.

Anyone else? I know dchaikin and kidzdoc expressed interest in a re-read, possibly in July. stretch, lunacat, lisapeet, RidgewayGirl, bell7, sallypursell, and Sakerfalcon all expressed interest on kidzdoc's thread in early May.

I realize the world has moved on since then and it may no longer feel like the right time for this book.

160jjmcgaffey
jul 1, 2020, 11:16 pm

>149 lisapeet: I read Gina Kolata's Flu : The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic a while ago (late last year) - very interesting. I've now picked up Barry's book as well.

161stretch
jul 2, 2020, 6:35 am

>159 ELiz_M: I plan on Starting Lost Children Archive soon as well but need to get to a good stopping point in my current read the Poppy War since I won't likely get it back for weeks.

162RidgewayGirl
Bewerkt: jul 2, 2020, 10:31 am

>159 ELiz_M: I'm in for that. I'm going to read Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay in Forty Questions first as Lost Children Archive is a reread. If a thread hasn't been set up, I'll do that now.

http://www.librarything.com/topic/322042#
Dit onderwerp werd voortgezet door WHAT ARE YOU READING? - Part 5.