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I love Joe Hill's disturbing book of short stories - "Full Throttle" - which also has good stories of growing up as Stephen King's son.

If any one likes comics my god king in black is so I believably good right now.

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I just read Proust. Took a long time!

payitforward wrote:I just read Proust. Took a long time!

How was it? I would love to read it. I known Penguin is doing a new translation, but I don't think they've finished it yet? I find it strange that each book has a different translator from my memory in the new version.

After I pass my NCLEX, I'm starting Don Quixote next. It's not Proust, but not short either!

Recently read The Queen’s Gambit by Walter Tevis, since it came up on Hoopla, and is getting so much hype on Netflix. Thoroughly enjoyed it but would hesitate to recommend. I was a tournament chess player more than forty years ago, so know the jargon. So, if you don’t know anything about the Sicilian Defense, probably should stay away because you’ll find out the heroine is not only playing the Sicilian Defense, but it’s the Alekhine Variation.

BTW Hoopla is great. My library has limited ebooks, but has access to Hoopla ebooks which greatly increases the selection.

For those that like noir genre mysteries I would recommend Adrian Mckinty, a writer from Northern Ireland. I’m currently reading his series about a police detective in NI during the “troubles”. It’s amazing how bad the situation was there not long ago. Pretty good there now. Fortunately, brexit didn’t screw it up.

Happy Towel Day! - for Douglas Adams fans https://bookriot.com/the-42-best-lines-from-douglas-adams-the-hitchhikers-guide-to-the-galaxy-series/?fbclid=IwAR2tjOeYT7Q_vNpV4xnJxRy6g_P-k0ZFa_fsj6PL4gHs4JqB7a630sY1UQY

Anybody local want a copy of Eddie Glaude’s book on James Baldwin, Begin Again? Someone gave me a copy and just wants it to circulate.

Vladimir777 wrote:

payitforward wrote:I just read Proust. Took a long time!

How was it? I would love to read it. I known Penguin is doing a new translation, but I don't think they've finished it yet? I find it strange that each book has a different translator from my memory in the new version.

After I pass my NCLEX, I'm starting Don Quixote next. It's not Proust, but not short either!

Don Quixote is a great book.

Crap -- sorry to be so long getting back into this thread.

Re: Proust -- I read Lydia Davis' translation of the first volume, Swann's Way. Then I did a little comparing of Volume 2 in the Penguin translation vs. the classic H. Scott Moncrieff version. I didn't like one much less or more than the other, so I finished the whole thing on my Kindle -- where the old translations are essentially free.

The deal with Proust is either you are on board with his way of looking at things, in which case the books are wonderful, or you find it hard to make that leap, in which case you get bored. Obviously, I was able to jump on his bus -- though there were times when I was tempted to pull the cord & jump off at the next stop. Overall, I enjoyed it tremendously.

bsilver wrote:Recently read The Queen’s Gambit by Walter Tevis, since it came up on Hoopla, and is getting so much hype on Netflix. Thoroughly enjoyed it but would hesitate to recommend. I was a tournament chess player more than forty years ago, so know the jargon. So, if you don’t know anything about the Sicilian Defense, probably should stay away because you’ll find out the heroine is not only playing the Sicilian Defense, but it’s the Alekhine Variation.

BTW Hoopla is great. My library has limited ebooks, but has access to Hoopla ebooks which greatly increases the selection.

Haven't read the book but definitely loved the adaptation as a series on I think Netflix.

I remember studying the Sicilian Defense as a teenager. But, I was a terrible chess player! Really awful. Yet... I loved the game!

I'm reading an absolutely great multi-volume work by the Chinese sci-fi writer Cichin Liu -- the series is called "The Three Body Problem," & that's the title of Volume 1 as well. Cannot recommend it highly enough.

payitforward wrote:I'm reading an absolutely great multi-volume work by the Chinese sci-fi writer Cichin Liu -- the series is called "The Three Body Problem," & that's the title of Volume 1 as well. Cannot recommend it highly enough.

I've also heard it's terrific, and Netflix is working on a series based on it. I'm looking forward to reading it - it's always more enjoyable to read a book/trilogy first before watching the series or movie based on it, imo. I think it's also sometimes called Remembrance of Earth's Past.

I also recently read Hiaasen’s latest novel Squeeze which was an
extremely thinly veiled rank on tRump and tRumpism. Pretty funny.

payitforward wrote:

Vladimir777 wrote:

payitforward wrote:I just read Proust. Took a long time!

How was it? I would love to read it. I known Penguin is doing a new translation, but I don't think they've finished it yet? I find it strange that each book has a different translator from my memory in the new version.

After I pass my NCLEX, I'm starting Don Quixote next. It's not Proust, but not short either!

Don Quixote is a great book.

Crap -- sorry to be so long getting back into this thread.

Re: Proust -- I read Lydia Davis' translation of the first volume, Swann's Way. Then I did a little comparing of Volume 2 in the Penguin translation vs. the classic H. Scott Moncrieff version. I didn't like one much less or more than the other, so I finished the whole thing on my Kindle -- where the old translations are essentially free.

The deal with Proust is either you are on board with his way of looking at things, in which case the books are wonderful, or you find it hard to make that leap, in which case you get bored. Obviously, I was able to jump on his bus -- though there were times when I was tempted to pull the cord & jump off at the next stop. Overall, I enjoyed it tremendously.

No worries about the late reply. I don't make it on here a lot of the time. I'm about 150 pages into DQ, so I have a ways to go. In Search of Lost Time is definitely one of the few longer novels than DQ! Glad you enjoyed it.

Well, there are a lot of loooong Russian novels!

Speaking of long.... Roberto Bolano's 2666 is absolutely tremendous as is his The Savage Detectives.

Also George Perec's Life A User's Manual.

Pretty much anything by Haruki Murakami is fantastic; The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is one of a kind.

David Mitchell's The Bone Clocks is a wonderful novel as well. Anything by him, really....

Just finished reading Brene Brown's Atlas of the Heart. Great book.

I’m currently reading two:

Family Lexicon. Natalia Ginzburg. It’s not a guy’s book (but then, I don’t like most guy books, unless that guy is P. Roth). So, no action, or not much action; no cheap, obvious drama. Nor is it one of those programmatic and drearily concepty Gladwell projects where we learn how (in ways subtle and not-so) to crush another man like a bug. Ginzburg is terrific. Brilliant, even, at times. The world she writes about is Italy in the mid-20th c. Keen insights into family and people and language. I love how non- it is: non-linear, non-commercial, non-contemporary.

The other is The Books of Jacob. Olga Tokarczuk. She won the Nobel a few yrs ago. Nominally about a false messiah among the Jews of Poland who converts to Islam and then converts thousands of Jews to Catholicism, it’s really about the world he’s at the center of — a world of liars, schemers, frauds; of fake news; of the worst, who are full of passionate intensity; of strivers and climbers; of things coming undone. A world very much like ours. It’s a daunting read, clocking in at almost a thousand pages. But she’s so sprightly and fun, and there’s fascination so far on every page.

Reread Thinking: Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman recently. Still throwing curves I have to think about even in second reading.

Finishing up Five Decembers right now. Probably the book of the year for me.

badinage wrote:I’m currently reading two:

Family Lexicon. Natalia Ginzburg. It’s not a guy’s book (but then, I don’t like most guy books, unless that guy is P. Roth). So, no action, or not much action; no cheap, obvious drama. Nor is it one of those programmatic and drearily concepty Gladwell projects where we learn how (in ways subtle and not-so) to crush another man like a bug. Ginzburg is terrific. Brilliant, even, at times. The world she writes about is Italy in the mid-20th c. Keen insights into family and people and language. I love how non- it is: non-linear, non-commercial, non-contemporary.

The other is The Books of Jacob. Olga Tokarczuk. She won the Nobel a few yrs ago. Nominally about a false messiah among the Jews of Poland who converts to Islam and then converts thousands of Jews to Catholicism, it’s really about the world he’s at the center of — a world of liars, schemers, frauds; of fake news; of the worst, who are full of passionate intensity; of strivers and climbers; of things coming undone. A world very much like ours. It’s a daunting read, clocking in at almost a thousand pages. But she’s so sprightly and fun, and there’s fascination so far on every page.

Tokarczuk is great -- I loved & highly recommend Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead. Can't wait to read The Books of Jacob.

Badinage -- do you know who Sabbatai Sevi was? A 17th century false messiah from Smyrna. His influence was enormous at the time, & he had a profound effect on European history. Don't have time to get into it now, but some day I'll write it up here. If you're interested enough to read a loooong book, Gershom Scholem wrote one about him.

Light reading: Martin Walker series about "Bruno, Chief of Police." Mysteries set in the Perigord (in France). Highly recommended.