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Post by babushka on Jan 4, 2010 11:42:57 GMT -5
I am reading Scott Johnson's books about haunted Texas. It's nice, like a vacation without the having to go anywhere.
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Post by School Girl on Jan 5, 2010 18:02:14 GMT -5
Beloved, of Toni Morrison/Oprah fame, is actually a ghost story! Kind of. I'm halfway through. Not much of a horror story but a neat, unique little read.
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Post by babushka on Jan 10, 2010 10:26:07 GMT -5
Oh yeah, I read Beloved in college, in my occult lit class. I don't remember it very well. All my memories have been supplanted by the movie version.
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Post by saucefox on Jan 10, 2010 11:36:42 GMT -5
oh! omg beloved is freaking genius! oh, i loved it so much. challenging, too. i read it in a class about cultural memory. really satisfying.
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Post by Almeda J. Becker on Jan 10, 2010 13:52:45 GMT -5
Recently reread a trio of Vonnegut novels. Still as fresh and timely as when I first read them over 25 years ago. Amazing.
Just cashed in a bunch of Xmas gift cards to get the latest from John Irving, Pat Conroy, and E.L. Doctorow. Not the most intellectually challenging of writers, I'll grant you, but I've (finished and) enjoyed everything of theirs that I've read. Engaging storytellers, all three. First couple chapters of the Conroy book have me falling in love with a city I've never seen.
Also gonna check out last year's Nobel winner, Herta Muller, starting with The Passport. Looks like some seriously depressing shit.
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SJ782
Victim
Suffering from Cranial Rectosis
Posts: 963
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Post by SJ782 on Jan 27, 2010 14:54:16 GMT -5
Confessor by Terry Goodkind. The 11th and last book of the Sword of Truth series. Like the other 10, it was long ( 700 pages or more ), but it tied everything together. Now if only Legend of the Seeker would try and follow the storyline, the show would improve. Maybe I'm asking too much.
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Joe
Victim
I don't wanna work, I just wanna bang on the drum all day.
Posts: 540
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Post by Joe on Jun 6, 2010 12:07:16 GMT -5
Just finished Willie Mays, The Life, The Legend by James S. Hirsch. I give it 9/10. It's great to finally have a detailed bio of one of baseball's all-time greats. Hirsch has his own agenda & goes out of his way to also make the book a history of the civil rights movement. Not that the subject doesn't interest me, but it's misplaced here; unlike Jackie Robinson or Hank Aaron, for example, Mays was never part of this movement, feeling that he was a ball player & not a speech maker. It's like Hirsch is dragging Mays into it kicking & screaming. But the book is well worth the effort for the baseball tidbits & the insights into Mays's character, particularly his generosity where kids are concerned.
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Post by chukrok on Jul 15, 2010 12:15:38 GMT -5
The last fiction book I read was World War Z by Max Brooks. Great stuff. Non-fiction was a filmmaking book by Josh Becker.
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VampyMar
Corpse
~Taking A Bite Out of Life~
Posts: 35
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Post by VampyMar on Sept 15, 2010 11:07:56 GMT -5
I'm a HUGE Janet Evanovich reader, & fan, particularly of her Stephanie Plum series, & I am now on the 13th one from that series. Had every book all the way up to #13 on paperback, but stopped at #10, 4 yrs ago. I think just knowing that Kathryn Heigl is playing the lead role of Steph(POOR choice), & has been filming it around Pittsburgh recently, made me pick up where I left off, & get back into those novels. I forgot how much I LOVE them, & how her writing makes me L-O-L!!
Halfway through #13, & gotta go to Target or Wallymart to pick up the last 3. She will probably write #17 now, & I bet it will be out by my birthday next June, as they always are each yr.
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Joe
Victim
I don't wanna work, I just wanna bang on the drum all day.
Posts: 540
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Post by Joe on Oct 1, 2010 17:16:08 GMT -5
Just finished The Brothers K by David James Duncan. One of the very best novels I've ever read. I give it 10 outta 10--no, make that 100 outta 10. It's an ambitious, 600+page story in which we follow the Chance family of Camas, WA from the years 1956-80, with the vast majority of the book taking place in the turbulent '60's & '70's. The dad is a minor league baseball pitcher, clinging to a dream playing with guys half his age, the mom is a religious fanatic, & 4 sons deal with the times in their own way---one a draft dodger, one an intellectual/Buddhist who goes to Harvard, then to India, one goes to Viet Nam, & the youngest narrates. It's a complicated book about family, baseball, war, morals, politics, & religion. There were passages that made my heart pound.
BUY THIS BOOK, YOU CHEAP SONS OF BITCHES!!
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SJ782
Victim
Suffering from Cranial Rectosis
Posts: 963
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Post by SJ782 on Oct 2, 2010 15:40:40 GMT -5
Saturn by Ben Bova. Bova has a series of books on visiting the planets and some moons. I've read Mercury, Venus, Jupiter and now Saturn. Saturn involves a gigantic ship where the people are chosen to be farmers, mechanics and other service related fields. They have huge farms, their own government and over seers. There mission is to keep themselves alive strictly on what they grow, what they raise and what they produce in their factories. Then everything gets crazy. Three people run for head of the government, people get killed, hunted down like game and buried in the field.. The next book is called Titan, where this same group explores Titan.
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SJ782
Victim
Suffering from Cranial Rectosis
Posts: 963
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Post by SJ782 on Jan 29, 2011 12:07:15 GMT -5
The Andromeda Strain. It didn't go down as well as the first time I read it, in 1972. Too much scientific BS for me these days. One thing I did note was that they talked about fiber optics and HD TV's. This book was written in 1969 ?? As far as I know, there were no fiber optics on any military installation I was on, and certainly no one qualified to perform maintenance on it. I was on a maintenance crew that was responsible for radios, generators, telephone systems along with the plumbing, heating and A/C, electrical work and carpentry. I dunno. Michael Crichton ran down the whole fiber optic trip as it is today.
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gmac
Corpse
Posts: 65
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Post by gmac on Jan 29, 2011 13:17:33 GMT -5
The Andromeda Strain. It didn't go down as well as the first time I read it, in 1972. Too much scientific BS for me these days. One thing I did note was that they talked about fiber optics and HD TV's. This book was written in 1969 ?? As far as I know, there were no fiber optics on any military installation I was on, and certainly no one qualified to perform maintenance on it. I was on a maintenance crew that was responsible for radios, generators, telephone systems along with the plumbing, heating and A/C, electrical work and carpentry. I dunno. Michael Crichton ran down the whole fiber optic trip as it is today. NASA was using fiber optic in the cameras taken to the Moon. The technology is old, but it wasn't until engineers discovered how to reduce the transmission loss that resulted in its widespread use. I remember a Nat'l Geographic magazine profiled it in the 70's. This will be on the test.
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SJ782
Victim
Suffering from Cranial Rectosis
Posts: 963
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Post by SJ782 on Jan 29, 2011 16:18:00 GMT -5
The Andromeda Strain. It didn't go down as well as the first time I read it, in 1972. Too much scientific BS for me these days. One thing I did note was that they talked about fiber optics and HD TV's. This book was written in 1969 ?? As far as I know, there were no fiber optics on any military installation I was on, and certainly no one qualified to perform maintenance on it. I was on a maintenance crew that was responsible for radios, generators, telephone systems along with the plumbing, heating and A/C, electrical work and carpentry. I dunno. Michael Crichton ran down the whole fiber optic trip as it is today. NASA was using fiber optic in the cameras taken to the Moon. The technology is old, but it wasn't until engineers discovered how to reduce the transmission loss that resulted in its widespread use. I remember a Nat'l Geographic magazine profiled it in the 70's. This will be on the test. Shows ya how much I know ! It just seemed odd to me to be reading a book 40 years old and them talking about fiber optics on a secret underground army installation. Now you know why I sat in the back of the classroom....... or in the corner.
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SJ782
Victim
Suffering from Cranial Rectosis
Posts: 963
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Post by SJ782 on Jan 31, 2011 13:19:26 GMT -5
Deadlands. I couldn't sleep. so I decided to read this. Nice stuff ! Just the thing for this time of year. Next up...... City of Demons ; also by Scott A. Johnson.
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