What is the best book you read recently?

[aljones]

I just finished "The Guns of August" by Barbara W. Tuchman. Awesome book for anyone interested in the history of the Western World, especially WWI.

you can read an excerpt on Amazon

http://www.amazon.com/Guns-August-Barbara-W-Tuchman/dp/034538623X

[GumboYaYa]

1. Kite Runner was really good.....

I need a good book now. Good timing on this thread.

[aljones]

5. I picked up the Kite Runner just the other day at Wal-Mart...

I haven't gotten into it yet...but I may have to read it next..

[jonnyblitz]

9. it's one of my favorites. the movie version of the book will

be out in November.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0419887/

[GenDem]

49. "A Thousand Splendid Suns" is coming out on May 22nd

It will be Khaled Hosseini's second novel. I am anxiously awaiting this one.

It has gotten great reviews.


http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1594489505/ref=amb_link_4547042_1/104-5305914-9686302?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-3&pf_rd_r=1HXACYG2CH7NSEPQDFCB&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=285317101&pf_rd_i=283155

[jonnyblitz]

58. oh cool. thanks for the info. i will have to read it! nt

[GumboYaYa]

16. I read it in a day when I was travelling.

Once I started, I could not put it down. Be prepared to be "nose in a book".

[wildhorses]

47. i loved the start of it but, for some reason when they moved

it started ...i dunno...it just got to formulaic for me:shrug:

[SteppingRazor]

2. Last book I read was Chasing Ghosts by Paul Reickhoff...

just finished it last week. Amazing book about the Iraq War by a former platoon leader. Highly recommended! :thumbsup:

[aljones]

6. I haven't heard of that one...I will have to check it out

[AllegroRondo]

3. "The Road" by Cormack McCarthy.

awesome. and it just won the Pulitzer!

[jonnyblitz]

I just finished it. I liked it also. nt

[aljones]

8. What is it about?

[AllegroRondo]

13. its a post-apocalypse journey

of a father and son. He doesnt get into details of why or how the world fell apart. There are very few people left alive, no animals, very few plants even. A father and son travel on a road, trying to move south before winter and find a safe place to stay alive.
Some very grim stuff. He really shows some of the darkest sides of humanity.

[aljones]

17. Sounds like the perfect book for me and my SO..

thank you so much for sharing!!!

[MichiganVote]

70. Awesome book, but will leave you with a literary hangover

[Chan790]

4. A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. by Ishmael Beah

If you haven't yet read this book...do so. That's all I can say...it took something not even on my radar (Children forced into combat and slavery) and made it a major issue for me.

If you have the opportunity to hear Mr. Beah speak, do that as well. He moves an audience.

[aljones]

7. I keep seeing this book on Amazon....I have been afraid to buy it..

I might give it another look now!!

[Chan790]

10. It's good but I will admit...

that a number of people I recommended it to, have let me nasty 4am messages because it was either keeping them up (in a bad way) or giving them nightmares.

Don't read it before bed. It's gruesome and blunt about the situation he's in. It's heartbreaking.

[aljones]

12. I might consider it for a beach read....Nothing can bring me down at the beach

[Omphaloskepsis]

11. The Complete Fairy Tales of Hermann Hesse.

A collection of 22 fairy tales written by Hermann Hesse. I still think Siddhartha is my favorite book of his. And I think I have just about read all of them.

[aljones]

14. I have never heard of him.....

Are they traditional fairytales?

[Omphaloskepsis]

19. No.. Not by the standards I would impose on traditional fairy tales..

They are very dark, I would not want to read them to children.

[aljones]

21. Cool, I will check them out.....

[arbusto_baboso]

15. My fave of his is Narcissus and Goldmund.

A really good treatise about the human psyche. It still haunts me to this day.

[Forkboy]

63. All his stuff is good.

:thumbsup:

[arbusto_baboso]

18. Once an Eagle by Anton Myrer.

If you ever want to read a dark, gritty book about the horrors of modern war, that one is it.

West Point makes it required reading for all its cadets (or at least it used to) to teach them how an officer is supposed to treat enlisted personnel and lead effectively.

But mostly it's about the fear, the uetter tragic waste, and the futility of war. If you don't cry when you read it, then you have no soul.

[BarenakedLady]

20. Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

by Christopher Moore.

So funny!

[aljones]

22. Sounds Hilarious

[BarenakedLady]

55. It is!

I love Christopher Moore stuff, so I may be a bit biased though.

[bluethruandthru]

29. That's a great book!

I rarely laugh out loud while reading...but this one made me chuckle the whole way through!

[BarenakedLady]

56. I love to laugh out loud

and it takes a lot for me to do so, but I did with this book.

:thumbsup:

[mitchum]

23. "Confederates in the Attic"...

hilarious and pathetic

[Ariana Celeste]

24. the Dune series

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_%28novel%29

:loveya:

[JitterbugPerfume]

25. The Road

by Cormac McCarthy


It was scary as hell

[wildhorses]

26. nothing that heavy for me

finally read emma by austen...the only one of hers that i have not read:shrug:

and yes, the movie 'clueless' gave it away:cry:

[aljones]

32. I love Jane Austen!!!

I love Emma too, but Pride and Prejudice will always be my Fav..

[wildhorses]

39. i really don't know what my favorite is---

i think i need to read them all over again:loveya:

i really right now love all of them equally:shrug:

don't try to take my austen!!!

i would hate to have my man duel at dawn!!!

[aljones]

40. here is a link for you

http://www.amazon.com/Jane-Austen-Handbook-Sensible-Elegant/dp/1594741719/ref=sr_1_6/103-3307755-9749436?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1177703886&sr=1-6

[wildhorses]

44. thanks for the link

:hug:

[Aristus]

"The McDonaldization Of Society". I picked it up at the library 'cause of its intriguing title.

Turns out, it's a scholarly sociology text used in colleges and universities. It's a pretty good read, though.

[EFerrari]

27. 9/11 and America Empire: Intellectuals Speak Out

It decimates the elaborate fiction we've been sold about 9/11.

9/11 -- it's not just for internet conspiracy theorists any more. :shrug:

[WindRavenX]

28. The Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins

He's my boy.

[aljones]

33. did he write a book on the non-existence of god?

or something like that...the name sounds familar?

[WindRavenX]

35. Yeah. "The God Delusion"

Another fantastic, fantastic read.

Darwin's pitbull, yo.

[aljones]

36. right, thats the one.....

I have it on my wish list at amazon.....

I am very impulsive so everything, especially books, go on the wish lists first....

[azmouse]

30. No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt by Doris Kearns Goodwin

[jus_the_facts]

31. The Hollow Man ~ Dan Simmons

[Gidney N Cloyd]

34. Halfway through Man Without a Country.

[aljones]

37. What is it about?

sounds kinda interesting

[Gidney N Cloyd]

71. Vonnegut's last work.

I'd forgotten I'd bought it until he died recently.
It's a lot of general musing about the unfortunate directions the US and mankind have taken from his youth to the present.

[cemaphonic]

38. Faulkner - Light in August

Full of Southern Gothicy goodness, and not as bewildering as Faulkner can often be.

[aljones]

41. In College I dated a guy from Mississippi...he loved Faulkner

and for the life of me I never could get into him, Faulkner that is, I might have to give this one another look...

thanks for the post

[Mrs. Venation]

42. Mockingbird: A Portrait of Harper Lee

by Charles Shields. It's a very well-written book about a fascinating woman. I highly recommend it.

[JitterbugPerfume]

43. I am currently reading

Dead Eye Dick , by Vonnegut

actually it is a re read , but It was a long time ago that I first read it .

Vonnegut never ceases to amaze me with his insights

[aljones]

45. I am ashamed to say I have never read Vonnegut...

he is someone I always mean to get around too!!! but alas, I never do!!
I really sould work harder at it!!

[JitterbugPerfume]

46. you wont be sorry

if you take the time to read his work

Start with Slaughterhouse Five or Cats Cradle

[aljones]

48. I actually own Slaughterhouse Five.....

so little time, so many books....that seems to be my moto!!!

[JitterbugPerfume]

50. me too aljones

I am so far behind , there is no way I can die before I am 100 yr old!

[aljones]

53. Call me Aly....

my problem is I don't finish the classics because I keep getting distracted by all the really interesting non-fiction that seems to just abound right now...

[Shakespeare]

69. I've always wondered how John Irving got away with such a similar story...

...when he published A Prayer for Owen Meany.

EXTREMELY similar concept, and having studied under Vonnegut, perhaps a bit too similar. And I say that as someone who adores Irving.

[terrya]

51. "Innocent Traitor" by Alison Weir

A novel about the life of Lady Jane Grey...great niece of King Henry VIII and Queen of England...for 9 days. A wonderful, very readable book. Highly recommended. :thumbsup:

[aljones]

52. Awesome!!!! Wonderful!!! I love Lady Jane Grey!!!

I am gonna buy that book right now!!!

[Gormy Cuss]

54. "The Sex Lives of Cannibals"

by J. Maarten Troost. Chronicles his life on Tarawa. Funny descriptions and wonderful self deprecation.

I immediately followed up with his second book, "Getting Stoned with Savages," about his stint in Fiji and Vanuatu.

[GenDem]

57. "The Thirteenth Tale" by Diane Setterfield

I'm about half way through -- it is very good, and very well written.

http://www.amazon.com/Thirteenth-Tale-Novel-Diane-Setterfield/dp/0743298020/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-5305914-9686302?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1177711761&sr=1-1

[Terdlow Smedley]

59. Insect Dreams

Can't think of author's name right now. Gregor Samsa doesn't get killed, merely injured, and goes on to be present and figure prominently in historical events, up and including the firing of the first atomic bomb.

[More Than A Feeling]

60. CivilWarLand in Bad Decline by George Saunders is a small collection of short stories.

I'm halfway through, and the best I can describe it so far is this: demented situations, real emotions.

[SmokingJacket]

66. That's a good description.

I love his stuff.

[bigwillq]

61. I am currently reading "The Italian Letter"

and it is quite interesing.

On those 16 little words Shrub put into his 2003 State of the Union.

[hippywife]

62. The last ones I read that I really enjoyed

were "Eat, Pray, Love" by Elizabeth Gilbert and "Inez of My Soul" by Isabel Allende. Before that were all the books by Billie Letts. Really good with quirky characters. And there was another fiction book whose title and author escape me at the moment in which the premise was that when people die as long as there is someone living that remembers them, they continue to exist in a different reality until everyone who remembers them dies, too. It was set within an apocolyptic tale where a virus was killing off the world.

[Wetzelbill]

64. "Flight" by Sherman Alexie

http://www.fallsapart.com/flight.htm

[Forkboy]

65. Epileptic by David B.......Don't expect to have the warm fuzzies when you're done though.

David B. was born Pierre-François Beauchard in a small town near Orléans, France. He spent an idyllic early childhood playing with the neighborhood kids and, along with his older brother, Jean-Christophe, ganging up on his little sister, Florence. But their lives changed abruptly when Jean-Christophe was struck with epilepsy at age eleven. In search of a cure, their parents dragged the family to acupuncturists and magnetic therapists, to mediums and macrobiotic communes. But every new cure ended in disappointment as Jean-Christophe, after brief periods of remission, would only get worse.

Angry at his brother for abandoning him and at all the quacks who offered them false hope, Pierre-François learned to cope by drawing fantastically elaborate battle scenes, creating images that provide a fascinating window into his interior life. An honest and horrifying portrait of the disease and of the pain and fear it sowed in the family, Epileptic is also a moving depiction of one family's intricate history. Through flashbacks, we are introduced to the stories of Pierre-François's grandparents and we relive his grandfathers' experiences in both World Wars. We follow Pierre-François through his childhood, adolescence, and adulthood, all the while charting his complicated relationship with his brother and Jean-Christophe's losing battle with epilepsy. Illustrated with beautiful and striking black-and-white images, Epileptic is as astonishing, intimate, and heartbreaking as the best literary memoir.

"A painfully honest examination of the effects of debilitating epilepsy on one man and his family, told through a combination of straightforward text and expressionist imagery that ranges in its palette from centuries-old symbolism to the secret worlds of childhood. Even as he shows up the hollow promises of every school of esoteric and alternative medicine his family encounters in their quest for help, David B. works a real kind of deeply human magic on the page—something forged from black ink and a soul's struggle—that marks Epileptic as one of the first truly great narrative artworks of the new millennium." --Jason Lutes, author of Jar of Fools and Berlin

"David B. has created a wildly beautiful fantasia on human frailty, on the making of an artist and the unmaking of his own brother—a memoir that is hopeful and bitterly poignant all at once." -- Paul Collins, author of Not Even Wrong: Adventures in Autism

[Shakespeare]

67. I'm 3/4 way through Dan Simmons' Hyperion series (4 books total).

I don't usually read much sci-fi, but Simmons' books are outstanding.

[YankeyMCC]

68. Doubt: A History

by Jennifer Michael Hecht - Really excellent, something I hope many many others will read.

For Fiction I'm just in the middle of "Absolution Gap" by Alastair Reynolds - This is the 5th in the series of novels in his Revelation Space series. I read a lot of Science Fiction for my fiction reading but I haven't been captured by a series or a timeline like this since Asimov's Robot/Empire/Foundation timeline.

I find myself whipping through all these novels which are 600 and 700 pages each as well as the collection of short stories that are set in this timeline.

[MedleyMisty]

72. Hmm.

Finished The Name of the Wind recently. It was decent.

Found a new Bertrand Russell book at Borders last night. :) It's the one with his essays about power.

Also reading the new biography of Einstein. I think I could have been friends with him. It's kind of annoying though, because the author is all like, "OMG, he was against war and had socialist ideals and felt empathy for his fellow humans and wasn't into herd mentality and stuff!!!111!!!" and I'm like, "Yeah, shouldn't everyone be like that?"

[hippywife]

73. I found the one I couldn't remember earlier-

The Brief History of the Dead by Kevin Brockmeier.

[opiate69]

74. "The Truth - with Jokes"