What BOOK are you reading right now?

I am reading short stories by Shakespeare .

Oh, wow!!!

Me too - the settings are a good half of why I read, vicarious travel and vicarious experience, and often plain old good writing.

I'm enjoying Herodotus, The Histories. Even at page 41, I know I'll not remember most of the detail I'm reading - it's a bath of names (some I'm pleased to recognize) and places in stories. Going to have to pull up some online maps as the maps given are a bit small for me. (Took me forever to find Athens, couldn't figure out why it wasn't there, heh).
Have taped the book, have hope it'll hang together for the ride.

I'm reading 'Either Side of Winter' by Benjamin Markovits -a former professional basketball player who grew up in Texas, but now lives in London and teaches Creative Writing at the University of London.

I'm really excited about this because I read alot of contemporary novels and this is the first in a LONG time that makes me just nod my head and say, 'Yes - this guy can write and this time I've spent reading has been worth something and has provided something other than a pleasant diversion.'

I will now proceed to read everything he's written.

Herodotus, page 55, Deioces at Ecbatana. Only 550 more pages of data I won't remember. Still enjoying it.

Thucidedes next?

Well, hey, I figure I'll be due for some contemporary pot boilers in between.

Atlas Shrugged.

I think I'm averaging about a page a day ...

Speaking of page-turners...

I just started Escape from Camp 14: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West by Blaine Harden.



Finding it hard to put down.

Bedtime: Listening to Raul Esparza read Stephen King's Under the Dome. Not that impressed with the novel, but really, really enjoying Esparza's narration style

Genghis Khan and The Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford.

I have a new historical hero.

Only you, Finn, could select a vicious, almost universally detested would-be Mongol world-conqueror as a personal hero. It explains a lot about your political orientation as voiced elsewhere on these threads.

One of my favorite parts of that book is the Epilogue...with Weatherford recreating Temujin's trek from the steppe to the mountains. You felt you were right there, every step of the way!

Herodotus' Histories is the perfect go to sleep book for me - not at all boring, actually fast paced in its way - but complicated, or at least filled with entirely new names 'spelled funny' and forward and back episodes re time, sans dates, and lots of changing geography. Last evening/this morning, I kept reading the same six or so pages over and over to get everyone straight. Quite a story about young Cyrus...

alternating between the fourth Fire & Ice Book, A Feast of Crows & Stephen King's new Dark Tower book The Wind Through the Keyhole

I've been meanng to read his Dark Tower series for a while now -- the first 7 books have been on my ereader forever and now he's gone and written book 8!!! I'll wait a while longer, having just finished his Under the Dome (as long as The Stand -- not quite as good).

Over the weekend, I read two non-fiction works that I very much enjoyed and recommend:

Mrs. Kennedy and Me by Clint Hill (in light of current events lol) and The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules our Lives by Leonard Miodinow.

the new book is sort of a standalone story, King suggests it's Dark Tower 4.5 if you want to read them in order

this is the first book in the series i've read, having listened to the rest through Audible, i'm gonna grab this one too, and might listen to the whole series again

Heh, I just checked and my library has the whole series (minus the newest one) in audiobook form -- many in .mp3 format, too! Might grab a few to stick on the reader or iPod.

Proving you know very little about Genghis Khan.

You should read the book and educate yourself.

just finished a really annoying piece of fiction

on to



the descriptions of life in an orthodox neighbourhood in Boro Park in Brooklyn are interesting. not sure if the book as a whole will work for me, but the anthropology angle is enjoyable.

Finished Mockingjay on Wednesday night.

At work, I started listening to Douglas Preston's Tyrannosaur Canyon but so far don't really like it enough to continue. I'll listen to one or two more discs before ditching it.

Otherwise, I've started reading The Flame Alphabet by Ben Marcus.