Short (230 pages before appendices) book on Nero and the author's attempt to delve into how much of Nero's reputation was fact v fiction.
Busy holiday weekend and it's still going... Read/red...readed 3 books put some siding up on the basement, mowed 2 acres, got to go out to get some beer and gas the car for tomorrow, then start another book...Life's a bitch. This one first "Suspect" Michael Robotham’s debut novel is an English psychological thriller. Joe O’Loughlin 'profiles' a murderer so well that he becomes the suspect....A can't put down type of book. ************************ Then for a change up I got hold of John Sandford's latest in the series. "Stolen Prey" Said it before, I wish I could write like this guy, especially the dialog. He's good. Starts with a particlary brutal murder, aren't they all. Good read! He has a new book coming out next month, one of the Virgil Flowers series called "Mad River" Already told the library to order it, they're good like that. ********************** Just put down Michael Robotham's "Shatter" Started it last night and fell asleep on it, woke up at 3AM with it on my mind so read some more until 4:30. Did some of my siding job and now recently finished it. Another of those psychological thingy stories. I keep thinking I can put it down anytime, apparently not! I have another of his that I'll start when I get back with the beer......Ain't life great...?????
Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett This one was published not too long before Pratchett announced that he had Alzheimer's, so as much as anything, I'm hoping not to see too much evidence of decline, but it's typically enjoyable so far.
I can think of a couple of books I've done that with. In the case of John Irving's Hotel New Hampshire and David James Duncan's The Brother's K, there were no ill effects. However, I did it twice with this book, and the result was some pretty disruptive nightmares. The Family, by Ed Sanders. Gee, a book on the Manson Family murders causing sleep problems. What were the odds? I only mention it because, by coincidence, over the weekend I started Sanders' latest book, his memoir of the 1960s centered around his life as a poet, a member of the Fugs, anti-war activist, publisher and bookstore owner, etc..
Yeah, I find it kind of funny that Sanders did the Manson book. BTW: every family should own at least one Fugs album.
I've powered through quite a few in the last few years as well. Can't really say I was disappointed in any. Killshot was a bit different than usual, but very good. Also liked La Brava. And Pronto. I also liked Hombre, which is a classic Western story. Didn't know that when I bought it, but still enjoyed it.
Bought this as a page-turner for a recent plane trip, but haven't got too far into it yet. Ken Follett's Eye of the Needle. Never really read any WWII spy novels before, but it was highly rated.
It does seem odd. However, any major Beat geek like myself who watched Sanders when he appeared on William F. Buckley's Firing Line in 1968 with Buckley, a sociologist named Yablowski or something, and an extremely shitfaced Jack Kerouac is less surprised. The topic was hippies. The show is mostly remembered for how far gone Kerouac was, but at one point Yablowski told of witnessing a scene at a California commune where one hippy guy was beating the crap out of another. No one would intervene because it wasn't right to interfere with the guy for whom "violence was his thing, man..." (paraphrased). Sanders called Bullshit, saying he's never seen any such behavior in any commune he's ever been around. Violence wasn't a hippy problem, it was an establishment problem. The Sociologist defended himself. Then a year later, Sharon Tate is killed. And a recurring theme in The Family is Sanders' exploration of the nature of the Manson Family compared to other hippies, and in short, trying to answer how this went down, and what does it say about his generation. So, I'm not sure (and I don't think he's going to address it in Fug You), but I think that Sanders was motivated by the questions that came up when he was on Firing Line. Remember how you used to come home and see a plastic bag containing a small sample size of some laundry detergent or other? In my ideal America, everyone would've received at least one bag holding It Crawled Into My Hands, Honest.
One of his first and best. They made a so, so movie of this as well. Almost made me feel sorry for the bloody Nazis. Almost..
Finished another of Michael Robotham's today. "Bleed for Me" I got a bit pissed at him in the middle of the book, thinking for someone "supposedly so smart, is a dumb turd. The book finished strong though. Well worth the read. Got to let him rest a while before I read any more of his. Same with any author overexposure isn't a good thing. " The sight of a 14-year-old girl covered in blood would rattle anyone, and psychologist Joe O’Loughlin is no exception when he opens his door to a terrified Sienna Hegarty, his daughter’s friend. Her incoherence is no help to the police, who find her father with his throat slashed in the home the two shared. But when Sienna’s hysteria gives way to an unnerving calm, her claim that she remembers nothing rings false. Did she kill her father?"
It is about growing up Catholic in the 50s and 60s in Providence, RI. Written by an admitted lapsed Catholic, it is hilarious in parts, especially if you were a Catholic child in that era. Was a free download on Kindle awhile ago.
I finally got my son interested in reading this... We learned a "new" word: incorrigible. Which is what Slippery Jim DiGriz is. A lot of fun re-visiting an old friend.
WWII spy novels, you say? Sounds like it's time for my semi-annual pimpage of Alan Furst. Start with Night Soldiers and move on from there. He's gotten less interesting as he's mined the genre, but his first 5 - 6 books are really good.
More Ed Sanders for me: Fame and Love in New York, a really funny satire on the art business. One character was described as "an enigma wrapped inside a mystery folded into a dipshit." I've had the book for almost 25 years and I'm finally getting around to reading it. Not quite as good as Tales of Beatnik Glory at their best, but worth it. Also starting, on a reread, Wanderlust: A History of Walking by Rebecca Solnit. Really interesting book. Like most books about walking, it's about that, and pretty much everything else, too.
Don't make me list a bibliography, Val. You'd be amazed. Good luck. Mine is a first edition. I'm not bragging, because it's the second editions of this book that are rare. But failing to find it, Tales of Beatnik Glory is full of good lines and turns of phrase. One of the characters in TBG opens a coffee shop called the Psychedelicatessen. There's a decidedly hippy/sixties bent to them, but they hold up. My favorite Tale of Beatnik Glory is a "Sho-Sto-Po" (short story poem) called "An East Village Hippy in King Arthur's Court." He gets there via an acid trip, and at one point says "Far ********ing Out," which becomes a favorite phrase of the Knights, and which, after the narrator speculates about how pronounciation has changed through the centuries, likely exists in our own time in the idiomatic expression, "for crying out loud."
Giving this a whirl now: Lynne Cox is the titular long-distance swimmer, and she did indeed swim to Antarctica. I knew of her first back in the Cold War days when she swam from the US to the USSR (Little Diomede Island to Big Diomede Island) - interesting side stories galore in the book, and all sorts of other tales about other swims. If you're interested in a quick idea of swims/places covered in the book, here's a GoogleMap of all of them.
Tomorrow, When the War Began I read this book, and the first 3 or 4 in the Tomorrow series, and quite enjoyed it. I remember thinking what a great miniseries it would make, sort of like I did with Hunger Games, and then pretty much forgot about the books. Just watched the movie and got me thinking I should re-visit, especially with a reluctant reader in the house.
A Fidelma of Cashel mystery set in 670 A.D. In addition to investigating a murder, Fidelma and Eadulf must deal with fanatics and possible heresies.
Growing up, I never had any interest in comics, but for whatever reason, I've found myself getting interested in graphic novels geared towards adults. I stumbled up on this one recently and breezed through its sparsely dialoged pages in about 15-20 minutes (if that long). This was a collection of six short stories. Athos in America by Jason I want to delve a bit deeper into this guy's work (his real name is John Arne Sæterøy) because he's really rather skilled in expressing intense human emotion though mostly silent anthropomorphized characters. Kind of an interesting combo. His work used to be difficult to find in America according to some stuff I've read online, but higher demand has made a lot of it available in English (it's originally in Norwegian.) Anyway, it's pretty intense stuff and deals with a lot of the darker/rawer side of humanity.
Oh, F-bomb! Can't find it in any libraries I have access to here. The library at the college where I worked through May? Seven volumes by Jason, with Athos in America on order.
"Breaking The Rule of Cool: Interviewing and Reading Women Beat Writers" ed by Ronna Johnson and Nancy Grace. Decent interviews, some with writers I'm not all that familiar with. I hesitated to read it when I was fueling up at the local coffee shop these past few mornings because it could easily look like I was trying to impress chicks with unshaven legs and underarms. But I got over it.
Overview of the life and career of Roger Staubach. Quick read. For someone labeled as an award-winning author, Carlton Stowers needs an editor to catch the numerous typos and improper usage of words.