Book Lovers Club
Comments
-
Oh, let's hope that libraries never go away, at least in my lifetime! One of life's great pleasures is visiting a good library! And holding a real book, with flaps!
0 -
Ruthbru, I have to agree, while I enjoyed Niffenegger's the Time Traveler's Wife, I found Her Fearful Symmetry creepy and not in a good way. The most likeable character was the kitten.
I just finished Julia Stuart's The Pigeon Pie Mystery - set in the grace and favor living quarters of Hampton Court Palace in the 1890's with a destitute Indian princess and her maid as the main characters, it was a lovely romp. Pokes gentle fun at all things British. I really liked it and have already taken out of the library her earlier book, The Tower, The Zoo, and the Tortoise.
Julie E
0 -
Finished reading Joe Queenan's One for the Books. Cousin read it simultaneously. We both loved it! Have to say, the Queenan book, the Anna Quinden book, Lots of Candles and Kevin Dutton's The Wisdom of Psychopaths were my favorite non-fiction works for 2012. Honorable mention goes to The Twilight War. Fiction? My favorite book for 2012... The Unlikely Pilgramage of Harold Fry. Where'd you go Bernadette... Runner up along with Jonathan Tropper's latest book, One Last Thing Before I Go.I know medical books are off limits for discussion, but I will throw out there Eric Topol's The Creative Destruction of Medicine and Otis Brawley's How We Do Harm. Very enlightening books.
Finally... Jonah Lehrer. I hope he reinvents himself in 2013. Don't we all admire comebacks? I hope the journalism and publishing businesses become more introspective and understand their responsibility in the Lehrer debacle. I hope they will do better as well in the coming year.
Happy holidays book lovers! Cheers!0 -
I don't know, I am having trouble getting into gone girl. Maybe I just have to sit and read uninterrupted for a while.
0 -
Oh, oh.....I just bought Gone Girl on everyone's recommendations. I need to rescan through The Hobbit quick before I go to the movie over Christmas break.
0 -
slipped in Dog On It by Spencer Quinn as I accumulate Julia Stuart books in reserve at the library. A very enjoyable read - mystery told from the view point of PI' Bernie Little's side kick Chet, a dog of unnamed breed. Very exciting and suspenseful missing person case (Chet chased through the desert, Chet at a kill-pound), (Bernie's car going over a cliff!) etc etc, plus just hilarious take on a dog's point of view. I think this is the first of a series.
0 -
Ruth, definetly don't go by me, I have had trouble finishing books since tx. This from some who read 5-6 books a week, and newspapers and magazines. I now take a day to read the newspaper. Sigh. I am getting better, but it may take a while to get back into reading
0 -
It definitely goes in cycles. I couldn't read anything heavy or philosophical for a long time.
0 -
Loved Gone Girl.
I am half way through Wild and really like it. It hits close to home with my mothers passing. So far I am loving the way she writes.
0 -
Moon - I loved Gone, Girl but my sister, who is a great reader is having a hard time getting into it. I just told her to try it again and get past the first 50 pages or so. I told her I would read it to her if I had to!
Laurie - I loved Wild, too. She is so honest about her experiences and feelings...good and bad.
VR - I loved The Unlikely Pilgramage of Harold Fry. I felt like I could recommend it without hesitation to my 85 yr old MIL who won't read books with "gratuitious sex and/or violence and over-use of the "f" word". Her father was British so I'm sure she'll like it. I just picked up Where'd you go, Bernadette from the library tonight...I've been on the waiting list forever, so I'm excited to start it.
Happy reading to everyone! Gina
0 -
I did find Her Fearful Symmetry 'different' I did enjoy the style of writing and also the book.
Just finished Salaam Brick Road which is by an English writer Tarquin Hall who returns to London's East End to live after living in India. Originally from a well to do part of London he writes about the differences he sees and the characters he meets - I enjoyed it, but then I know the part of London he writes about.
Just finished Ozzy Osbourne's biography... OMG! what a laugh. Very easy read, lots of cussing (as you would imagine) but an insight into his life and his personality. Not a fan of his music, but enjoyed the book.
Now halfway through Billy Connolly's bio - so happy that I am now reading again. Didn't do much of it at all during tx.
0 -
Tazzy... I'm a Billy Connolly fan too! Loved the film, The Man Who Sued G-d!
0 -
voracious: I saw him live in London many years ago.... from the moment he stepped on stage the audience was laughing all the way home.
This book is written by his wife Pamela Stephenson who is also a physchologist. Thought that film was brilliant, quite clever really.
0 -
I didn't like Gone Girl that much, I liked her earlier books better. I just finished In the Shadow of the Banyon, about the Kmer Rouge and liked it.
Currently reading the Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and liking it.
I've been off the boards for a while, so sorry if these were already discussed.
I also liked the Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry.
Voracious, I talked to Otis Brawley when he gave a lecture, interesting guy to talk to. I read his book with fascination as I used to work for a rad onc who would treat patients who maybe didn't need treatment, and he explored that topic both in person and in the book.
I have a good friend who keeps a bedside diary of all the books she reads and finds it fascinating to revisit it. I want to follow her example, as I can't remember for very long what I've just read...Was in a book group with a woman who told a story about another group keeping a log after they started the fifth book for the second time...
Kira
0 -
This article appeared recently in the Wall Street Journal...It's an excerpt from Joe Queenan's new book. The book is TERRIFIC! I included a link to the full article. The list he keeps of the books he's read and wants to read is arresting. Enjoy!
My 6,128 Favorite Books
Joe Queenan on how a harmless juvenile pastime turned into a lifelong personality disorder.
By JOE QUEENAN
I started borrowing books from a roving Quaker City bookmobile when I was 7 years old. Things quickly got out of hand. Before I knew it I was borrowing every book about the Romans, every book about the Apaches, every book about the spindly third-string quarterback who comes off the bench in the fourth quarter to bail out his team. I had no way of knowing it at the time, but what started out as a harmless juvenile pastime soon turned into a lifelong personality disorder.
![[image]](http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/RV-AI510A_QUEEN_DV_20121019192059.jpg)
Thomas Allen
If you have read 6,000 books in your lifetime, or even 600, it's probably because at some level you find "reality" a bit of a disappointment.
Fifty-five years later, with at least 6,128 books under my belt, I still organize my daily life—such as it is—around reading. As a result, decades go by without my windows getting washed.
My reading habits sometimes get a bit loopy. I often read dozens of books simultaneously. I start a book in 1978 and finish it 34 years later, without enjoying a single minute of the enterprise. I absolutely refuse to read books that critics describe as "luminous" or "incandescent." I never read books in which the hero went to private school or roots for the New York Yankees. I once spent a year reading nothing but short books. I spent another year vowing to read nothing but books I picked off the library shelves with my eyes closed. The results were not pretty.
I even tried to spend an entire year reading books I had always suspected I would hate: "Middlemarch," "Look Homeward, Angel," "Babbitt." Luckily, that project ran out of gas quickly, if only because I already had a 14-year-old daughter when I took a crack at "Lolita."
Joe Queenan, author of the new book "One for the Books," discusses reading books, loving books, saving books and hating e-books with WSJ's Gary Rosen.
Six thousand books is a lot of reading, true, but the trash like "Hell's Belles" and "Kid Colt and the Legend of the Lost Arroyo" and even "Part-Time Harlot, Full-Time Tramp" that I devoured during my misspent teens really puff up the numbers. And in any case, it is nowhere near a record. Winston Churchill supposedly read a book every day of his life, even while he was saving Western Civilization from the Nazis. This is quite an accomplishment, because by some accounts Winston Churchill spent all of World War II completely hammered.
A case can be made that people who read a preposterous number of books are not playing with a full deck. I prefer to think of us as dissatisfied customers. If you have read 6,000 books in your lifetime, or even 600, it's probably because at some level you find "reality" a bit of a disappointment. People in the 19th century fell in love with "Ivanhoe" and "The Count of Monte Cristo" because they loathed the age they were living through. Women in our own era read "Pride and Prejudice" and "Jane Eyre" and even "The Bridges of Madison County"—a dimwit, hayseed reworking of "Madame Bovary"—because they imagine how much happier they would be if their husbands did not spend quite so much time with their drunken, illiterate golf buddies down at Myrtle Beach. A blind bigamist nobleman with a ruined castle and an insane, incinerated first wife beats those losers any day of the week. Blind, two-timing noblemen never wear belted shorts.
Similarly, finding oneself at the epicenter of a vast, global conspiracy involving both the Knights Templar and the Vatican would be a huge improvement over slaving away at the Bureau of Labor Statistics for the rest of your life or being married to someone who is drowning in dunning notices from Williams-Sonoma WSM -2.16%. No matter what they may tell themselves, book lovers do not read primarily to obtain information or to while away the time. They read to escape to a more exciting, more rewarding world. A world where they do not hate their jobs, their spouses, their governments, their lives. A world where women do not constantly say things like "Have a good one!" and "Sounds like a plan!" A world where men do not wear belted shorts. Certainly not the Knights Templar.
I read books—mostly fiction—for at least two hours a day, but I also spend two hours a day reading newspapers and magazines, gathering material for my work, which consists of ridiculing idiots or, when they are not available, morons. I read books in all the obvious places—in my house and office, on trains and buses and planes—but I've also read them at plays and concerts and prizefights, and not just during the intermissions. I've read books while waiting for friends to get sprung from the drunk tank, while waiting for people to emerge from comas, while waiting for the Iceman to cometh.....
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444868204578064483923017090.html
0 -
Kira...I'm jealous!
0 -
That book looks awesome! Thanks for the heads-up, VR!
0 -
One more Julia Stuart finished - The Tower, The Zoo, and the Tortoise have you ever considered what it is like for the Beefeaters and their families living in the Tower of London surrounded by so much history, ghosts and protocol? Also, what kind of things do people leave behind on the London Underground and how are they returned? Well here is your book - with love and humor.
now here is one, for you or the middle grade child in your life. Dark Lord, the early years by Jamie Thomson. It is the story of a cruel beast thrust from another realm who lands in mall parking lot in the body of a 12 year old boy. How he deals with foster care! psychologists! and making friends/gathering followers? amongst the outcasts in middle school is a hoot.
0 -
Just finished Wild by Cheryl Strayed, and started Where'd you go Bernadette? by Maria Semple. Liked Wild, and am liking Bernadette, so far.
Jane
0 -
Just found this thread-I got Gone Girl for Christmas and finished it-but didn't really like it. I didn't know how it would end-which was a good thing but it was one of those books that made me feel unhappy when I finished.
So looks like people have recomended some books that make you laugh-tht's what I will pick up next.
0 -
lilylady-
check my postings on this thread, for the most part I avoid sad books. Do NOT READ Little Bee, whatever you do. Absoutely Heart-wrenching.
Julie E
0 -
I liked "Where'd you go Bernadette?". It took me a little time to get used to the format but I thought it was very clever and quirky. I've been busy at work so I haven't been reading much lately. I don't know what I'll start next.
Jelson - I have Little Bee in my TBR pile, thanks for the warning. I may put it off for a while.
Happy New Year to all the good readers on this thread and looking forward to many new recommendations in 2013!
Gina
0 -
greetings fellow bibliophiles! I'm just back from vacation, during which I read five books: "666 Park Avenue" (now a TV series about dynastic families of witches, utter trash but an OK airplane read), two of the Prey series by John Sanford (gotta love Lucas Davenport), Stuart Woods' first book "Chiefs" from 1981 re-released in paperback (very good, and the first in the Will Lee series), and Maeve Binchy's "Minding Frankie" (a tear-jerker but as heart-warming as you'd expect from her).
Perhaps I should resolve to read at least one non-fiction book next year. Today's paper has three on the best-seller list that look intriguing: "The Signal and the Noise" by Nate Silver (an examination of predictions, the ones that come true and the ones that don't), "Tap Dancing to Work" by Carol J. Loomis (a collection of Fortune magazine articles on Warren Buffet (whom I greatly admire) published between 1966 and 2012), and "Roll Me Up and Smoke Me When I Die" by Willie Nelson (whom I don't like so much but what a great book title).
However, I am more likely to go for "Notorious Nineteen" by Janet Evanovich.
Wishing you all a Happy New Year of reading!
0 -
"The Art of Fielding" is $1.99 on Amazon for Kindle today!!
0 -
Greetings all and Happy New Year. I've been AWOL from this thread for a bit, but have been reading! Thanks for all your recommendations, I just made a long list, they all sound so good I don't know where to start! I think the Joe Queenan articles have piqued my interest for sure. Like him I'm guilty of reading several books at a time and sometimes not finishing some for years.
Lately I've read Tolstoy's Anna Karenina and am glad I did before seeing the movie, it would be hard to follow otherwise. Saw the movie with a few friends, I liked it they didn't, they especially didn't like Keira Knightley, who played Anna. It was filmed as though you were watching a play on a very rustic stage. My friends thought the costumes were the best part of the movie! I think I liked it because it was a different and creative way to present the story.
Of interest; Laura Lippman has curated a collection of excerpts of new and soon to be released mysteries and thrillers, it's available to download on Amazon & B&N for free. The title is: The Best Mystery & Thriller Books.
Wishing you all the best for 2013!
0 -
Just finished "DoveKeepers" by Alice Hoffman. I do like Alice Hoffman, but had to force myself to read and then finish the book. I guess I wasn't crazy about the story, although I liked the characters. If you can say this about a book, it had too many words!!
0 -
I have put aside Gone girl. Can't get into it right now. Went to start reading my favorite series from book #1. Wishing you all a wonderful New Year! May 2013 be better than 2012
0 -
hey Monica, I didn't like Gone Girl at the beginning either. Wondered what all the fuss was about but kept reading and was glad I persisted.
Just started a thrift-store paperback find: Welcome to the World, Baby Girl! by Fannie Flagg. She wrote a good book turned into a good movie: Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe.
#37 on the reserve list for Notorious 19.
HNY everyone.0 -
Just finished The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch
In the fantasy genre (ala Throne of Kings?) a thrilling tale of an audacious young criminal and his small band of confidence tricksters. Set in a fantastic city of canals, pulsing with the lives of decadent nobles, avaricious merchants and daring thieves, it is a story of adventure, loyalty, and survival. Alot of blood and gore and revenge but no sex, no love story!!! just double and triple crosses! Several very powerful and intelligent women characters, enthralling.…
0 -
Just finished Erik Larson's Thunderstruck. I absolutely love his writing style! It is (as the front cover proclaims) 'a ripping yarn of murder and invention'. It interweaves the stories of an unlikely murderer in Edwardian London, Guglielmo Marconi, the inventor of the wireless, (whom I will never look at the same way again), and the race for technology at the beginning of the 20th century. Fascinating!
0
