What are we reading right now? (Planning related or not)

[Random Traffic Guy]

Just finished Hoover Dam: An American Adventure by Joseph Stevens. An engineering history of the project, very similar in style to the classic The Great Bridge by David McCullough. It was worth reading, interesting and apparently comprehensive as a general history, but I just felt there wasn't a lot of meat to it. Nothing wrong, but didn't leave much of an impression. 2 out of 5 on my tough nonfiction scale.

Finished audiobooks of Cormac McCarthy's Border Trilogy. I don't know what McCarthy has against Mexico, but damn. All of these were slightly more conventional than Blood Meridian, so less of the pretentious BS that would be stupid if it was from anybody but McCarthy. But they didn't have the huge highs of that novel (which gets a rare 5/5 on my tough fiction scale).
All the Pretty Horses gets 3.5 out of 5, very good. Avoid the movie, it's a sad comparison.
The Crossing gets 3 out of 5, good and some amazing moments rivaling Blood Meridian, but too long.
Cities of the Plain gets 3.5 out of 5, a very good melding of the characters that you come to care about. Initally the ensemble cast kind of turned me off compared to his usual solitary protagonists, but it grew on me. I really like seeing stories with people who are very competent, and enjoy working together without drama or BS. This is one reason why I like the movie 300 despite its over the top nature elsewhere.

Highly recommended pulp spy/adventure book: Dead Six by Larry Correia and Mike Kupari. Engrossing military adventure told from viewpoints on either side of some espionage/terrorist schemes.
Larry Correia is emerging an an excellent new novelist on the sci-fi/fantasy side. His Monster Hunter series are great pulp fantasy stories (what if monsters were real, and bouties put on them to keep them supressed and out of public view), and Hard Magic is an excellent alt-history where magic is real and plays a role in world history starting about 1900. All of these rate about a 4/5 from me.

[Zoning Goddess]

"The Widower's Tale" by Julia Glass. Enjoyable novel of a family, and their conflicts, in the Boston area. I will be looking for the author's other novels. Luckily, our local library has all of them.

[ThePinkPlanner]

I finally got my copy of Night Circus from the library. I still have to read the conclusion, but so far I'd rate it one of the best novels I've read in years. Fantastically colorful and illustrative. Erin Morgenstern can set a scene.

[wahday]

Started the Hunger Games this week. Almost done. Its really not bad and a real page turner!

[otterpop]

As seems to happen a lot, I am reading several books at once. My son's bedtime story is The Fellowship of the Rings.

I am reading Until I Find You, by John Irving. And last night, when I couldn't sleep and I was too damn lazy to go upstairs and get my book, I started reading The Shipping News. So much for my goal this year to read some books that would make be feel better.

[Maister]

As seems to happen a lot, I am reading several books at once. My son's bedtime story is The Fellowship of the Rings.

Interesting. The trilogy is next on my schedule of books to read. I make it a point to re-read them every couple years or so.

[boiker]

I'm currently reading APA Policy guides, APA magazines, the Green book, on-line resoures, and stacks of note cards.

[Mud Princess]

I'm currently reading APA Policy guides, APA magazines, the Green book, on-line resoures, and stacks of note cards.

Sad....



I'm reading Richard Louv's The Nature Principle. I believe it was recommended in this thread. Excellent so far.

[ofos]

I'm reading Richard Louv's The Nature Principle. I believe it was recommended in this thread. Excellent so far.

Yeah, I thought it was good too but it does start to get repetitive after a while. I'm reading Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold. Don't know how I managed to never read this back in my environmental activist days in the 60's & 70's.

[Seabishop]

1688 A Global History - John Wills

The Russian Debutant's Handbook - Gary Shteyngart

I usually don't read two books at once but they're very different.

[Zoning Goddess]

Joshilyn Jackson's "A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty". I'm a big fan of southern fiction, and I've enjoyed her books in the past. RJ got me this one for my birthday. So far, a 45-y.old grandma thinks her family's cursed every 15 years because she had a daughter at 15, her daughter had a daughter at 15, and now that daughter is 15 and something entirely unexpected has happened.

Next up: Rick Riordan's "The Serpent's Shadow". It's the 3rd in the Kane Chronicles series by the author of the Percy Jackson Olympus series. Another b-day gift.

[Gotta Speakup]

I am reading Elaine Pagel's Revelations: visions, Prophecy, and Politics in the Book of Revelations.

She is quite the biblical scholar and writes in a form understandable and entertains for those who are not all that familiar with these topics.

[Zoning Goddess]

Today I picked up "Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter" at the bookstore. Any Cyb reviews? I recently read a couple books in a series about Jane Austen being alive and a vampire, and it referenced Abe and some other historical figures as having been vampire hunters, but they weren't by the same author. Coincidence?

[Zoning Goddess]

Van Reid's "Cordelia Underwood, or the Marvelous Beginnings of the Moosepath League", a quirky novel, rather amusing, set in1896 Maine. I will have to look for the sequels. Very enjoyable. Came out in '99, wonder how I missed it.

[Mud Princess]

I am reading Bad Dog (A Love Story). I couldn't pass up a book with that title.

[Brocktoon]

I am reading the aptly named book, "The Company Town" by Hardy Green. An interesting book talking about the development of cities by a corporation. It covers the often thought of communities like Hersey and Gary, IN as well as many of the coal, textile and mining communities that srung up as well. Its a quick and easy read so far.

[Coragus]

Kevin Smith's "Bull ***t" I saw him Friday night and got the book the same day.

[fringe]

Donated $25 to Joseph Campbell Foundation and received download of five hours of lectures on Eastern mythology, including lectures on Hinduism, Buddhism, Indian mystical traditions, art. They are broken into segments of a few minutes each but are sequential.

If you like Joe Campbell his lectures are easier than reading his work, but you have to hear them over and over to assimilate. As a result I have picked up Oriental Mythology (of the four volume Masks of God) again.

[boiker]

Just picked up Straphanger from the library. Probably telling me more of what I already know.

http://www.amazon.com/Straphanger-Sa.../dp/0805091734

[GISgal]

I am just starting to read Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed. Just finished Born to Run by Christopher McDougal. Vyer interesting read - even for a non-runner.

On my ecclectic list:

The Last Chicken in America by Ellen Litman.
Shaghai Girls
Secret Daughter
Stephanie Plum Series by Janet Evanovich.

Looks I found some good ones to add here.

[btrage]

I'm reading Fireproof right now. My wife borrowed it from someone 6 months or so ago, so I decided to read it. Before I started reading it, I asked my wife if I thought it would be corny. She said yes.

Now I am not a religious man by any means, but I do find the central tenet of the book to be a very valuable lesson for relationships. That being that you love someone because you make the decision to love them, not becaue of a feeling it gives it, or because you expect anything back.

I don't think that all marriages can be saved by the theme of this book. But I do think it is a humbling idea.

Over the weekend, I finished Theodore Rex, the 2nd in a trilogy by Edmund Morris about the life of Teddy Roosevelt. It doesn't matter what you think of him politically, and how his progressive ideas were contrary to the conservatism of the time, he was/is simply one of the most fascinating Presidents we will ever have.

[Zoning Goddess]

Over the weekend, I finished Theodore Rex, the 2nd in a trilogy by Edmund Morris about the life of Teddy Roosevelt. It doesn't matter what you think of him politically, and how his progressive ideas were contrary to the conservatism of the time, he was/is simply one of the most fascinating Presidents we will ever have.

I'm reading "The Murder of the Century" by Paul Collins, about a NYC murder in 1897 that involved adultery, abortion, Pulitzer and Hearst, dismemberment...and Teddy Roosevelt's reforms as police commissioner.

I guess it was a huge case back in the day, but I've never heard of it, and probably most people in this day and age haven't, either.

[OfficialPlanner]

I'm half-way through Moonraker by Ian Fleming. I've picked up an interest recently in the Bond books.

[ofos]

Just finished "Iberia" by James Michener. About to start "Sin Killer" by Larry McMurtry. It's the first of four volumes of the Berrybender Narratives and I got them all in hard cover at Half Price Books for $1 each. I don't expect them to be as good as the Lonesome Dove series but at that price...

[otterpop]

Just finished "Iberia" by James Michener. About to start "Sin Killer" by Larry McMurtry. It's the first of four volumes of the Berrybender Narratives and I got them all in hard cover at Half Price Books for $1 each. I don't expect them to be as good as the Lonesome Dove series but at that price...

I love McMurtry's fiction. His prose flows. Haven't read the Berrybender series yet, though I have eyed them in the library. I am reading "The Evening Star," the sequel to "Terms of Endearment."

One of his greatest gifts as a writer is making major characters who are not so likable, but are admirable. You don't care for them perhaps but you want to know more about them. Captain Call is one. Aurora Greenway is another.

I still haven't completely forgiven him for killing off Gus, Jake Spoon and Deets. We all want to know a Gus McCrea. We all know a Jake Spoon ("a leaky vessel to put too much hope into") And we all would be better knowing a man like Deets.