Posted on 01/08/2008 7:59:25 AM PST by MplsSteve
It's time again for my quarterly "What Are You Reading Now?" inquiry.
I'm always curious as to what Freepers are reading and what they're recommending to others.
It can be anything...a classic novel, a scientific journal, a magazine, a cheap pulp novel...anything.
Do not deface this thread with a smart-ass answer like "I'm Reading this Thread". It became very un-original a long time ago.
I'll start. I'm reading "The Great Deluge: Hurrican Katrina, New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast" by Douglas Brinkley.
This is a full account of Katrina striking the Gulf Coast. The book starts 48 hours before landfall and finishes one week after landfall. It a very good book.
Trust me, no one comes out of this looking good. Ray Nagin doesn't. FEMA doesn't, etc.
Well, what are YOU reading now?
You’re one up on me. I started to read that years ago and just could not finish it.
Kite Runner. I might start reading that Tom Hanks movie that is coming out soon. I sometimes like to read the book before seeing the movie. I think it will be a good book and movie.
I agree the one-world government and one-world religion freaks me out...Come soon Lord Jesus! You might find this interesting: www.reinventingjesuschrist.com.
Imperium: A Novel of Ancient Rome by Robert Harris
Could be called low-brow or mass market, but I am a sucker for novels set in ancient Rome.
Semper Fi,
I didn’t think I could use the reader, love the feel of books and going to bookstore and library. But I love it. Hubby just got a kindle yesterday so we are comparing. I like the sony better.
Alternating classics with trash or semi trash. Just finished Wambaugh’s latest book and loved it. ANd reading all of Philip Roth, just never read him much and he is good.
I will give 2009 a maybe, but I am going this summer. You can’t believe the draw this land will have for you once you have made the jump to the backwoods. It is not an easy place to live or visit.
Now: Focault’s Pendulum
Recently: Jurassic Park, Beowulf (trans. Seamus Heaney), and The Children of Hurin.
Simple. Because life's too short to waste time reading crappy, moronic liberal books.
I recommend all of them.
I'm not sure what I think of Perkins' book. It's interesting. Much of it is an eye-opener. Some descriptions of Third World poverty overwhelm the imagination. I am certainly open-minded and downright solicitous of new ideas and different points of view. However, I'm not sure I trust Perkins' conclusions. I've only read about a forth of the book; maybe I'll be more certain when I've read more.
Amazon Beaming is a very interesting autobiographical view of the inhabitants of the Amazon jungle, especially the Mayoruna, by a man who lived among them. Part of the experience was extraverbal communication, the manipulation of time, and mind-altering plant extracts.
I have just finished reading Wizard of the Upper Amazon by F. Bruce Lamb, also autobiographical, about a man who lived among the Huni Kui, a tribe of Amazon Indians. It is more interesting to me than Popescu's book. The tale unfolds like a novel. The narrator is fifteen years old and helping to extract rubber from the jungle as part of a family business, which he is endeavoring to learn, when he is unexpectedly kidnapped by the Huni Kui. He lives among them, learns their ways, and becomes one of their leaders. The reader doesn't learn until late in the book just why they kidnapped him, but they had good reasons. The intelligence and education needed to live among them is comparable to those needed in our highly complicated society. The subtleties and complications of the jungle plants and animals must be mastered to the level of fine art or a complicated tax code. Among these are the various mind-altering, poisonous, nutritious, and medicinal qualities of the plants. He masters the use of mind-altering plant extracts and consequent extrasensory perception, and, interestingly, this becomes a pivotal factor in the plot of his story. I found this book fascinating.
I also just finished My Grandfather's Son by Clarence Thomas. I absolutely recommend this book most highly! It is fascinating. I couldn't put it down. Thomas is brilliant and multifaceted. Basic to him is the love of truth, justice, humanity, and the U.S.A. He takes the reader into the horrors of racism and segregation; yet the sheer irony of his prose and the events of his life make the reader laugh again and again. Like his beloved grandfather--whom the reader reveres just as Thomas does--he refuses to allow the evil and cruelty that he encounters in life to interfere with his love of truth, justice, humanity, and his country--a lesson for all of us for which Thomas gives explicit instructions--and this is Enlightenment! I advise everybody to give this book a try!
Last GREAT book I read:
“Lone Survivor”
The story is almost biblical in the moral conflict faced by these Navy SEALs in Afghanistan who were faced with killing two unarmed goat herders, or letting them go knowing their own deaths were the most likely result. The leader of the team was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously.
I just finished:
“Snow Crash”
It is actually juvenile in some places, and is actually an interesting book that portrays what the Internet may turn out to be, but was written in 1992 before the Internet as we now know it really got off the ground. Kind of a cross between Blade Runner, Water World and...well...I don’t know. Not for everyone, but technophiles will find it interesting. Kind of like eating Girl Scout Cookies which kind of taste okay, but wondering if the calories are really worth it.
Currently listening to the audiobook:
“The Book Thief”
This is an interesting book, taking place in Nazi Germany in 1937 to (currently in late 1942) where Death is the narrator telling the story. I decided to read it, because there was a parade in my town recently, and the “Friends of the Maynard Library” marched by all holding signs saying things like “Read “The Book Thief”” and “Book of the Year: “The Book Thief””. Well, my first response was “This has to be a liberal book, otherwise the librarians would not be pushing it so hard...must be about fascists and conservatives, which are the same thing in their eyes...” and I actually forced myself to read it to prove I wasn’t going to be a slave to my stereotypes. It is pretty good, but does portray Germans VERY sympathetically (sympathetically in the form of “not all Germans were BAD or even Nazis”, which is certainly true) and the serious bombing of German cities has not yet begun. Interestingly, Death seems like a very nice and thoughtful entity. Humans understandably fascinate him.
I am currently reading:
“Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae”
THIS is a very good book, and I am only about five chapters into it, but I like it immensely already. This will likely be one I will buy, and will read it every couple of years.
>>Confessions - St. Augustine
Hard to get through. The guy comes across as someone playing Renfield to a divine Dracula. :)
Next will be the new Vince Flynn book - Protect and Defend.
Starship Troopers is actually a very good book. I have heard people refer to it as a fascist piece of literature by I am only about half way through it and I find myself agreeing with a lot of the points being represented.
It’s incredible. Stop by for it tonight. Right now I’m in the early part, pre-McCarthy. Did you know that Soviet agents in the pre-WWII US government cooperated with Soviet agents in the Japanese government to direct Japanese resource acquisition to the southern area (Philippines etc.) rather than the northern (Siberia)? Neither did I. He’s got it documented six ways from Sunday.
I know, I know... should have read that several years ago, but didn't get around to it :-)
>>>> Ptolemy’s Almagest
>>Do you have to be an expert to read this?
If you’ve read Euclid’s Elements, the Almagest isn’t too bad. If not, then there are better ways to get an overview of Ancient Astronomy.
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