Generally speaking, I'm eyes deep in technical documentation for things Apple. I'll post if that changes.

i bought a couple of books recently (2007) that i'll get round to reading pretty soon, i reckon! (christmas time / 2008).

btw, nice cover art on Rant

Not sure if you all have seen it up close. It's a dust jacket with circular die cut. The "R" is a it the printed title in gold foil in the hard cover underneath. The illustration is quite nice and wraps around the whole cover. All his covers are quite clever.

Oh.

And so far a good read too...

I only read Chuck Palahniuk and magazines. I had no idea he had another book, so I guess I'll be buying that one. He went to the same school that I live across from right now, UofO. I only found that out after moving here, so it was a pretty cool fact to come across.

nothing apart from my course textbook, after finishing EON i discovered the prequel and sequel to it were discontinued so trying to find second hand copies if i can

To Kill A Mocking Bird

agree with i-sync, one of my all time favs

TEU.. you might really enjoy The Annotated Alice by Martin Gardner.

i'm enthralled with Redneck's nickname for idiosyncratic! iSync it is! wonderful...

interestingly, Jed Perl's book is waiting for me at my local library, bull. it's been on request.


i read a lot, i read fast, and i read any damn thing i can get my hands on. the library has a special little bin for me, as their reserve shelf space is limited. i just went upstairs and got the stack of nonfiction from next to my bed. i won't list the fiction titles.. preference for hard sci-fi here, but i read a book a day of fiction.. it's like some people watch tv.

non-fiction this week:

Jacquard's web : how a hand-loom led to the birth of the information age. by James Essinger.
card weaving techniques, Babbage, Ada Byron, Thomas Watson, and on to Howard Aiken.



Natives & Settlers, now & then : historical issues and current perspectives on treaties and land claims in Canada / edited by Paul W. DePasquale.

this was published in 1965, but it's good background to review before the book about current land claim issues gets to the library.



Nuns : a history of convent life, 1450-1700 by Silvia Evangelisti.

i was expecting to be bored; this one's fascinating.



The buried book : the loss and rediscovery of the great Epic of Gilgamesh by David Damrosch

so far, talking about the compostion of the epic around 1200 BC. (Gilgamesh was a very cool superhero)



Confessions : an innocent life in Communist China by Kang Zhengguo

a free spirit in the context of the Cultural Revolution. the stories/vignettes illuminate some cliches for me, and destroy others.



Charm offensive : how China's soft power is transforming the world. by Joshua Kurlantzick

China's making nice all over the place.



i'd love it if all of you would give a brief synopsis/review like some have done. that's very helpful.


x

Mick, have you heard of a guy called Frank McCourt? He wrote three books about his life, Angela's Ashes which was made into a film for tv, T'is and recently Teacher Man. All brilliant and all made me cry.

He's basically an Irish boy growing up in a catholic family and then emigrating to America and dealing with it. All really good reads.

So what should i read next? I like crime thrillers in the mould of James Ellroy, fantasy like Clive Barker, and sheer comedy like Carl Hiaasen (see my first post)...

I'm willing to read something not in my usual... Biff give me OS X Admin stuff!

Finally had a few hours to read the second volume yesterday. Wow. I'm a fan of Spiegelman's, and I had NO idea that a) he was one of the co-creators of the Garbage Pail Kids (got screwed on royalties by Topps, btw), and he worked at the New Yorker for 10 years (he designed that famous cover for the magazine after sep.11).

Anyway, great graphoc novel. I read it in one sitting.

Did you mean YOU haven't read the first volume, or did you mean that I was missing out by not reading the first?

(I have)

Yup, good read!

i read Angela's Ashes a few years ago, and i agree, McCourt is a fine writer. i'll keep an eye out for his other books, thank you. (you too, Redneck.. for reinforcing.)

Maus was a great enjoyment to read.. in a sobering way. Spiegleman refused to offer any consolation at the end of the third book, because there is none. i was particularly touched by his refusal to "whitewash" Vladek's own racial predjudices.

Meska.. you could well enjoy China Miéville's books. He's wordier than Clive Barker, but i like his politics much better. Try Perdido Street Station. you might also like The Janissary Tree by Jason Goodwin. Yashim Lastname, an brilliant eunuch, is a marvellous character, and the Ottoman Empire in the mid-1800's is a great place for a murder mystery.

I'm slightly between books at the moment after Spook Country...I was trying to spin that one out on the train a bit, and it was OK, I guess...not my favourite Gibson. I've been going through a bit of a Gene Wolfe phase; lots of short stories from a liquidation shop that for some reason periodically has his stuff. My favourite science fantasy author.

I had forgotten about Chia Mieville...I bought a couple of his books from that same shop after reading that first one (maybe it was Perdido Street Station, I can't remember)...good stuff, but I seem to have wandered off in the middle of the last one. It reminds me of Mary Gentle, for some reason...Rats and Gargoyles..? My memory is shot. I think there was a sequel named Architecture of Desire, which is a good title.

When I don't have a novel to read, I re-read older things, so Nicholson Baker's The Size of Thoughts lives in my bag at the moment. I can't actually take too much of that at the moment, because when I opened it up all these pictures and scribblings from 1999 fell out...stuff dating from a time when I actually drew and jotted down things that seemed noteworthy. Apparently I was quite fired up by his essay on The Projector, as there were all sorts of diagrams and cut-outs of intermittent mechanisms that I had made in my efforts to understand it. Thinking back on it, that must have formed the basis for the stop-motion animation I made that year. Year after that...I bought a computer, stopped producing anything worthwhile. Heh. That film has aged well; my CG output has dated.

Any good recommendations? I'm looking for something evil, scary and downright nasty.

I'm reading cryptonomicon right now! I'm about 1/2 way through.
also reading 'in conquest born' by CS Friedman. Read a few of her later books (this being the first I think) and found them to be pretty addictive and colorful.
I've also dipped my eyes into 'Drawing on the artist within' by Betty Edwards. had to stop because there are exercises to follow that I want ot do, but not enough sit down time to do them properly.

I read pretty much everyday, probably for at least an hour. lately I've been reading lots of forum stuff at work and Iv'e been pretty busy at home so my pace has really slowed to a crawl.

I'll also read pretty much anything that enters my hands, and I've enjoyed in some form or another almost everything Ive read. I actually think there are only a handful I haven't.

At the moment my all time fave is James A Michener. the guys a freaking genius. also for fantasy RA Savaltor is def. at the top of my list. I've been tossing the odd spy/WWII/thriller/nazi type book into the mix of fantasy to great effect. I also really like biographies and book that make me learn something, but I read mostly to unwind not to wind my brain up so those usually take a long time to read. Which is why I like michener so much being historical fiction, the facts are right, and many events (usually explained in depth at the beginning or end of the book, and lists sources as well).

er … also kafka on the shore is pretty good too.

Naturally.

jesse said...Have you read "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle" by Haruki Murakami, meska? You might like it.

I thought it was a bit, as you put it,

meska:Any good recommendations? I'm looking for something evil, scary and downright nasty.

It's way better if I don't tell you anything about it. Just pick it up and enjoy the ride.

I'm reading "Norwegian Wood" by him at the moment. I'm not along way into it yet.

Next on my hitlist, cheers dude.

CLOCKERS

Maus -A Survivor's Tale