What BOOK are you reading right now?

Yeah - Pratchett! I haven't even heard of that one. Old or new?

The Agony and the Ecstasy - Irving Stone

I usually only read light fiction. But someone gave this to me, and its 700 pages intimidated me so I put it aside until recently. But I was surprised to find it fascinating once I started it. I'm about halfway through. This is biographical fiction about the sculptor Michelangelo. The book covers his whole life. The movie with Charlton Heston covers only a small piece of the greater story told here.

What's the book's first sentence Equus?

I absolutely loved that book. You either do or you don't. The guy was absolutely driven.

I am reading a book by Ben Macintyre "Josiah the Great", The True Story of the Man Who Would Be King. Talk about fascinating! A little different from the Hollywood version.

just finished re-reading neil gaiman's "neverwhere"

started reading "american gods" by the same author

listening to "the talisman" by stephen king and peter straub

Somehow the new site is bumping up plenty of old threads I've been missing so far. This is one of them.

I'm currently reading a book by the philosopher Daniel Dennet, Freedom Evolves. It's about the question how our traditional concept of free will is consistent (or not) with the new discoveries of neurologists in brain physiology. After exploring the subject from various interesting angles, he concludes that free will continues to be a valid concept.

I'm making very slow progress reading this book, but in this particular case that's a feature, not a bug. Dennet's writing is readable, logical and captivating -- not a common combination among philosophers -- but every ten pages or so, I have to lay the book aside and think -- and than I find related things to think about too, which leads to yet other thoughts, and so on.

This, of course, is by no means the worst thing a book can do to you, so I'm more than happy of progressing on a 20 pages a day basis.

Somehow the new site is bumping up plenty of old threads I've been missing so far. This is one of them.

probably people tagging favourites, that's what i've been doing

Cool about the tagging/ voting doing what it's supposed to do.

I just finished Daniel Gilbert's "Stumbling on Happiness." SO good. Highly recommended. Starts stronger than it finishes but fascinating throughout, IMO. (Hmm, could probably get a sig line out of it...)

Funny, I just decided to look up this thread.. under, duh, books, and found it easily, since it was listed first, and maybe that had something to do with tags (I don't know.)

So, I'm reading December Heat by Luiz Alfredo Garcia-Roza, in english translation, my third book by him. It's one of a police procedural series set in Rio, specifically the Copocabana, Ipanema, and Peixoto areas. Our protagonist is not your usual policeman, something of a routine mode for police procedural protagonists, but slightly different with emphasis on a certain quiet psychological exploration. I like the books for more than the usual reasons of sense of place and decent writing ability - I actually like his writing for itself, presuming the translation is related.

To quote the San Francisco Chronicle, "Full of startling twists and clever misdirection. Garcia-Roza is an eclectic expert at literary sleight of hand, flashing cards from the decks of Robbe-Grillet, Poe, Hemingway, and even Mickey Spillane." Well, I've only read Hemingway and Spillane. I just like the writing.


I should add it seems to me an excellent translation by Benjamin Moser.
The other two books I've read by Garcia-Roza are Southwesterly Wind, and
The Silence of the Rain.

Cities of the Plains
by Cormac McCarthy

At least five or six years old.
It is funny, but useful, too.
Some of the recipes sound really good!

O and in between I started 'For whom the bell tolls'

HAROLD BLOOM'S. compendium--"Genius"--A mosiacof One Hundred exemplary creative minds-- It is a wonderful book

The Covenant - and I can't understand much of it just because it has a lot of Jewish remarks and phrases and I'm not Jewish. However, I will finish it and ask a friend to explain. :-D

I'm reading Michael Pollan's 1997 book, A Place of My Own (The Education of an Amateur Builder).

I like it a lot and have several quotes already to put on a couple of my old threads, Wee Houses, and Tiny Houses. He gives his own observations, obviously, through the process of building a little writing studio on his property, but he also gives a lot of other people's points of view on such an endeavor: Thoreau, sure, but much more.

I bought the book originally because I'm interested in small housing, easy on the land, and I've also built my own studio, now about fifteen years ago, from near scratch, taking down three of the exterior walls of our old garage, adding beams, windows, doors, etc.

Plus I like design in general, and site design, as in working out what goes where on the land, and why.

Pollan is very thoughtful, so much so that if I were married to him I might be forced to scream, "enough already" every once in a while... but I'm mostly appreciative of his thoughtful discourse.

I'd recommend it highly to anyone with similar interests.

http://www.amazon.com/Place-My-Own-Education-Amateur/dp/0385319908/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1222296694&sr=8-1

The Divine Sarah by Arthur Gold and Robert Fizdale.

A hair-raising tell of derring-do.

I have read this several times. It really is very interesting.

I am working my way through the Harry Dresden Files by Butcher. I am on the fifth one right now.

Started Howl's Moving Castle last night - a fabulous young-adult book!

a pretty cool tale, two young girls on an adventure in a london that's nothing like the one they grew up in

the story has an alice in wonderland meets harry potter kind of vibe, the author may be setting himself up for a series, as he mentions other cities that mirror their real world counterparts, Parisn't, No York, etc

Publisher's site
Un Lun Dun
Wikipedia
Un Lun Dun