Books, your favourite and current reading

[Poseidon Rising]

In an effort to get to know some people on this forum I would like to talk about favourite books you've read and what your currently reading. Please give an outline of what the book is about be it novel or otherwise.

Here is a list of some of my favourite reads in no particular order:

Stalingrad by Antony Beevor, This is a truly wonderful read that will appeal to anyone with even a fleeting interest in WW2. It's a deeply engrossing work of narrative history. Very concise and a real eye opener.

You’ll Die In Singapore by Charles McCormac, This is an amazing true story of a prison break from a Japanese POW camp shortly after the fall of Singapore. This is a truly amazing story of survival against extreme odds. What these men endured I would never of thought possible. If it’s not still in print then nip down to your local library because I thoroughly recommend this. Everyone should know their story.

King Rat by James Clavell, I found this to be a great read on life in a Japanese POW camp. Although fictionalised the author was held in one of these ‘camps’ during WW2. That experience has certainly given him a unique ability to describe the goings. It’s mildly humorous with some great characters. It is the only work of James Clavell I have read so I would be interested to hear of anyone’s thoughts on his other books.

Cosmos by Carl Sagan, This is without a doubt my favourite book on science. Carl Sagan is an amazing scientist with a wonderfully open mind. His theories, thoughts and involvement with some of the most amazing research makes this book a must read for anyone of a scientific disposition.

Hannibal by Thomas Harris, Well if anyone ever doubted that the book is always better than the film this will set them straight! I loved this disturbingly enough. The book brings you further into the world of Hannibal Lecter than any film could do. It is one of the few novels I have read within two days. Strangely enough I borrowed this one from my Nan!?

Well there my favourites. I am currently reading Mao, A Life by Philip Short[/]. It has been sitting on my bookshelf for sometime and I have finally decided to plunge into it. Don’t ask me why I bought this biography because I could not honestly tell you! It happens to be the biggest book I own, it’s dimensions speak volumes! It is very detailed and makes for a surprisingly interesting read.

 

[BCLG100]

i like the LOTR trilogy (tolkein) , the dark materials trilogy (pullman) , the wind on fire trilogy (william nicholas), the grail quest trilogy (bernard cornwell) i think thats how its spelt, right now ive just finished bernard cornwell excallibur and im looking for a new book to read but i cant find any which seem interesting. any ideas anyone? i prefer history related books, fantasy or sci fi? basically nerdish books

 

[Marla_Singer]

I'm currently reading "Winston Churchill, Charles de Gaulle, la mésentente cordiale" (the cordial disagreement if you want, playing on the name of the France-Britain's alliance the "Entente cordial" or cordial agreement)

 

[Adso de Fimnu]

Reading this summer:
Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake
Middlesex by Jeffery Eugenides (won a Pulitzer)
Baudolino by Umberto Eco
Six Wives by David Starkey
Possession by A.S. Byatt (won a Booker prize)
A Short History of Byzantium by John Julius Norwich

All have proved to be more than satisfactory reads.

 

[Ancient Grudge]

I like the Starbuck Chronicles by Bernard Cornwell (ashame he has only written four).

I'm currently reading Berlin The Downfall 1945 by Antony Beevor which in my humble oppinion is far better then Stalingrad.

 

[Padma]

The Childe Cycle, by Gordon Dickson. (Sometimes incorrectly referred to as the Dorsai Series.) A series of novels and related stories describing the evolution of man from Homo Sapiens to "Ethical/Responsible Man". The stage is the thousand years from 1400AD to 2400 AD. When the Phase Drive is invented, mankind expands to the stars, with each segment of society grouping more or less together into the "Splinter Cultures", chief of which are the "Faith-Holders" (the 'Friendlies' from the Worlds of Harmony and Association), the "Philosophers" (the 'Exotics' from Mara and Kultis), and the "Warriors" (the Dorsai, from The Dorsai). There are also other groups, such as the Scientists on Venus and Newton, the Entrepeneurs of Ceta, etc. When all these facets have developed to their maximum extent, they start interbreeding, combining the best traits of each into what should eventually be the next step on the evolutionary ladder. It is also the story of the struggle between the two sides of the human psyche: the desire to learn, to strive, to "become God", and the desire to remain safe, and avoid the unknown.

(A very poor discription of something that covers a dozen books, and would have been more if not for Gordie's untimely death a few years ago. )

I was also a fan of Tolkien before he became popular.

I'm currently re-reading Anne McAffrey's Dragonriders of Pern series. Good relaxation.

 

[dgfred]

I like the Starbuck Chronicles by Bernard Cornwell (ashame he has only written four).

I'm currently reading Berlin The Downfall 1945 by Antony Beevor which in my humble oppinion is far better then Stalingrad.

Several guys in the History Forum have talked of this book on Berlin, looks

like it is a 'must read'.

 

[Immortal]

Right now IM reading the Ethics of Liberty by Rothman and Barricades and Borders 1800-1914 by Gildea

 

[denyd]

My favorite books are the Foundation series and the Robots of Dawn Series by Asimov.

With 4 SGs & 2 GOTM's there's not much time for reading these days.

 

[Johann MacLeod]

at the moment i'm reading "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbra Kingsovler. its part of my summer readign project for AP English.

 

[Plotinus]

The last books I read were, I'm ashamed to admit, "The Da Vinci Code" and "Angels and Demons". Both great fun, provided you can suspend your disbelief sufficiently to swallow the historical nonsense underlying them.

But I don't really have time to read books for fun. Only on the tube.

 

[Perfection]

Still Reading Gould's "The Structure of Evolutionary Theory."

It's among the longest and most difficult books I've read.

It's a thoroughly awesome book though.

 

[Plotinus]

[Perfection] Anything by Gould is awesome - although it sounds like that one isn't exactly intended for a general audience, so I don't know if I'll get round to it!

 

[cgannon64]

I just finished The Glass Menagerie, and I have four other plays to read for school (although for once I'm not dreading my summer reading).

I'm purposefully avoiding all the Russian plays I have to read...too many character with too many confusing names.

 

[Eli]

For me this summer is the summer of reading books I've always planned to read but never did.

After hearing about them in countless creation-evolution debates I finally got Dawkins' The Blind Watchmaker and Climbing Mount Improbable. Reading the Watchmaker now.

I also got, after a long time of wanting to read it, Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel. I went through the book in three days and it was a fascinating read. What's really good about this book is that in addition to the main ideas Diamond is making, every page contained(at least for me) a wealth of new information.
I bought Diamond's the Third Chimpanzee(sp?) because it was cheap and sounded interesting, not sure if it's good though.

Since biology/anthropology is not really a field I have knowledge in, I got Barbara Tuchman's March of Folly and Fukuyama's The End of History. I'm on familiar ground with these books.

But the really big one, and my main goal for the summer is Shirer's The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. This one was on my book radar for many years, and I finally found the time and will to go through it.

 

[FredLC]

Favourites: Herman Melville's "Moby Dick" and Vitor Hugo's "Les Miserables"

Current: Immanuel Kant's "Critique of the Pure Reason"

Regards .

Edit: I just bought one that must be most amusing - Maquiavel's "The Prince" - that I actually have already read; but this one with a bonus - notes from no other than Napoleon Bonaparte. Now it really must be cool to read an manual to be a king through cruelty and lack of conscience and get the insights of one of most fearsome conquistators of human history.

Regards .

 

[Plotinus]

Wow, Fred, what edition is that? I assume you haven't got hold of Boney's personal copy.

 

[Bigfoot]

I recently finished 'In The Heart of the Sea'. It recounts the sinking of the whaleship Essex by a rogue sperm whale circa 1810 (the attack later inspired Herman Melville to pen 'Moby Dick'). Its only about 220 pages, but tells a compelling story of the crew's attempts to survive in three small boats stranded thousands of miles from land. Although Quakers, the crew were eventually reduced to cannibalism towards the end of their journey.

I also recently read 'Middlesex' by Jeffrey Euginides, which I highly recommend. The protagonist is of indeterminate gender, although he/she is not initially aware of being different from anyone else. I don't want to ruin it for anyone, so I won't go on. This is a very well-written novel.

Currently I am reading 'Caeser Against The Celts', but I only just started it. One amusing tidbit, early in his career Julius Caeser slept with a neighboring king to secure the use of boats during one of Rome's campaigns. Later on detractors would mockingly refer to him as the 'Queen of Bythnios', although I doubt that anyone said it to his face and lived. His early upbringing reminded me in some respects of Elizabeth I, in that both had to use considerable courage and wit to survive beyond their teens.

 

[samildanach]

Edit: I just bought one that must be most amusing - Maquiavel's "The Prince" - that I actually have already read; but this one with a bonus - notes from no other than Napoleon Bonaparte. Now it really must be cool to read an manual to be a king through cruelty and lack of conscience and get the insights of one of most fearsome conquistators of human history.

I found "the Prince" unpleasant and more than a little silly. Not worth reading in and of itself. But one annotated by Bonaparte sounds very cool. Is it really him or is it someone who thinks he is Napoleon? Look out for sections where he writes "I will expand upon this point tomorrow after I have my weekly shock therapy. Goodnight Josephine! Goodnight Teddy!"

 

[FredLC]

Wow, Fred, what edition is that? I assume you haven't got hold of Boney's personal copy.

It was an edition from the Brazilian company Revista dos Tribunais, or RT, which specializes in legal texts but has also a lot of titles in phylosophy, methodology, etc...

Here is the link to that exact book.

Regards .