What are you reading? (#3 or whatever)

  • Thread starter Thread starter Vamp Jenny
  • Start date Start date
"The Breach: Inside the trial and impeachment of William Jefferson Clinton" by Peter Baker: Really interesting books so far. I really like Baker's prose and his detail is exceptional. Going through all the dynamics of President Clinton's impeachment trial is fascinating.

"The Wrong Enemy: America in Afghanistan 2001-2014" by Carlotta Gall: It's an interesting read, but at the same time I'm a little skeptical of of Gall's sourcing. She has a LOT of unnamed sources, which I'm always reluctant to subscribe an overt amount of credibility to, and numerous sources that are virtually impossible to independently verify. I'm not saying she's making anything up or anything like that, but she draws a number of pretty charged conclusions, and in instances like that I expect a higher standard of support for those conclusions.
 
Taake
Taake
ooh, I have a really hard time when authors make charged conclusions with few or no sources backing them up. It usually grates me to the point of madness if it goes on throughout. I find it sloppy.
I am currently reading two books right now: Daring Greatly by Brene Brown and The Valley of Amazement by Amy Tan. Both great!
 
"The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11" by Lawrence Wright.

This book one the Pulitzer Prize and I can see why, it's excellent. It's a highly detailed, incredibly comprehensive account of the origins and history of Al-Qaeda and it's very complex leadership structure. I'm about 150 pages into it so far and am really digging it. Wright writes (ha) well, and it's fascinating subject matter. I also finished "The Search for Al-Qaeda" by Bruce Reidel a few weeks ago, which delved a bit more into the ideology of the group, so this has been a great followup.
 
I'm about 100 pages into A Dance With Dragons by GRRM. I can't even tell if I enjoy these books anymore, I just want to be finished them so badly.

I've also just started & Sons by David Gilbert. I'm only about 20 pages in so I can't say how good it is yet but I like the writing style so far, engaging and intelligent.
 
Robb Stark said:
"The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11" by Lawrence Wright.

This book one the Pulitzer Prize and I can see why, it's excellent. It's a highly detailed, incredibly comprehensive account of the origins and history of Al-Qaeda and it's very complex leadership structure. I'm about 150 pages into it so far and am really digging it. Wright writes (ha) well, and it's fascinating subject matter. I also finished "The Search for Al-Qaeda" by Bruce Reidel a few weeks ago, which delved a bit more into the ideology of the group, so this has been a great followup.
Click to expand...
Both those books sound fascinating! Thanks for mentioning, I plan on picking them up now.
 
Robb Stark said:
What don't you like about them?
Click to expand...

It's not even that I don't like them, I clearly do if I've stuck with them this long. I love the story but I don't enjoy 60% of the reading of it. I don't need 5 pages describing what's being ate at a feast. Definitely not at this stage of the story. The length of time it's taking for individual character stories to link up is frustrating (I have no idea how people have endured this wait for nearly 20 years.) I'm just not enjoying the journey of reading the books at all but I am invested in the characters and want to know what happens to them really badly, so I keep with them.

I started Game of Thrones this time last year and I'm only a 100 pages in A Dance With Dragons now. Normally I'd finish a book in a day or two, a week tops if I'm busy.
 
I just finished the magnificent The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, and started James Gleick's Chaos about the Chaos Theory, and another of Dawkins' books, The Magic of Reality.
 
Just finishing the Book Thief. Truly good book, I adore the writer's style. It's easy to read, but the themes and the passion the book holds makes it great for anyone. One of those rare magical stories you'll read once in a while.
 
Kean said:
It's not even that I don't like them, I clearly do if I've stuck with them this long. I love the story but I don't enjoy 60% of the reading of it. I don't need 5 pages describing what's being ate at a feast. Definitely not at this stage of the story. The length of time it's taking for individual character stories to link up is frustrating (I have no idea how people have endured this wait for nearly 20 years.) I'm just not enjoying the journey of reading the books at all but I am invested in the characters and want to know what happens to them really badly, so I keep with them.

I started Game of Thrones this time last year and I'm only a 100 pages in A Dance With Dragons now. Normally I'd finish a book in a day or two, a week tops if I'm busy.
Click to expand...

You know how much of a fan I am but I found large swaths of ADWD frustrating too, especially pertaining to the character arcs linking up. I can appreciate that all of his effort now is going into getting the story to where it needs to be to end, but that does take something away from the entertainment factor of each unit.

I just finished Bend Sinister by Vladimir Nabokov and it's gorgeous and disturbing. Definitely one to go for if you're interested in surrealistic narration and wordcraft. Starting Snow Falling on Cedars next thanks to a recent rec, but only a page or two into it so far.

Also reading Ulysses by James Joyce but it's not my cup of tea.
 
Kean
Kean
The jury is still out on Ulysses being a truly work of genius or the worst thing every written ever. If you want to read Joyce, I'd rec Dubliners, particularly The Dead.
Right now I'm reading Fifty Shades of Grey by E L James and Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier. I'm switching between them because I can only put up with Fifty Shades for a little while, until I get so annoyed with it I have to read something else for a while.
 
Taake
Taake
Lol 50 shades pissed me off so bad! I had to switch between books too in order to get through it :)
I'm reading We Who are Alive and Remain: Untold Stories from the Band of Brothers by Marcus Brotherton. My husband and I finished watching the Band of Brothers TV series a couple weeks ago and I wanted to read the books the soldiers who were in Easy Company wrote about their time and see how it compared to the series. This book contains stories of the soldiers in Easy Company who weren't highlighted in Band of Brothers, though I am going to read that next.

My grandfather was a medic in the 82nd Airborne during WWII and he was in almost all of the battles highlighted in the series, though it's about the 101st Airborne.
 
Kairos said:
Also reading Ulysses by James Joyce but it's not my cup of tea.
Click to expand...

Been reading it too but not sure it's for me either... Depends on the mood I'm in while reading 🙂

Kean agrees: The jury is still out on Ulysses being a truly work of genius or the worst thing every written ever.
Click to expand...

Does one necessarily exclude the other 😉

I just finished Val McDermind's "A darker domain" which was a good detective story right up until the end when it all just ended abruptly and unfulfillingly because of which I'm not sure I'll read anything of hers again. Was a good vacation read though 🙂 and now back to my schoolbooks!
 
Last week I finished 'We Need New Names' by NoViolet Bulawayo and started 'The Lost Stradivarius' by J Meade Falkner. I should finish that tomorrow and then I have a couple of options to choose from.
 
Just finished We are Not Ourselves by Matthew Thomas, took a little getting into, but when I did I couldn't put it down.
 
I've been trying to read Dracula for the second time but I can't stick with it. I lose interest after Jonathan Harker's first chunk of journal entries. I'm probably going to be reading a Buffy novel next.
 
I'm reading two books at the moment.

The first is "A Problem from Hell: America in the age of Genocide" by Samantha Power (America's current Ambassador to the United Nations), which recounts the American response to genocide since about WWI. I'm still early into it but so far it's been a fascinating, and heavy, read. It won the Pulitzer Prize when it was released.

I'm also rereading "Team of Rivals: The Genius of Abraham Lincoln" by Doris Kearns Goodwin, who is a Pulitzer Prize winning author, and it's one of my all time favorites. It's the ultimate study in leadership and really, is a modern masterpiece.
 
Just read Steppenwolf which was brilliant, I'm kicking myself for not reading it sooner, in a way it reminds me of The Master and Margarita, another favorite of mine,

Now I'm reading "Little women" and with the risk of offending some fans of this tome... So far I'm just not getting why this is a big deal. So far so dull and characters I just can't care about. Yet at least. If it doesnt get better soon I might have to give up.
 
Little Women can be pretty dull I agree 🙂

I'm reading Gone Girl at the moment, because someone gave me the book and told me I had to read it...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom