Hello. After all the serious talk of god and what not recently, I though I'de dip in and see what all you great people like to read in your free time. I'm currently reading "Stupid White Men" (Michael Moore). Heres a list of some of the books I've read recently:
there isn't enuff room on this page to write down all our books... between 5 of our top readers, it would be about 5,000 books 
i would venture that i alone have read close to 2,000
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I'm currently reading through "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms", which is an old Chinese novel about the conflicts between 3 ruling factions as the Han Dynasty is falling apart. I'm really enjoying it although at times it is a tad samey, challenge after challenge from the leading generals, each one panning out in similar ways, grates a bit. Oh and Wu, my favourite of the Kingdoms, doesn't feature nearly enough 
Before that I just finished "Teeth of the Tiger" by Tom Clancy. I heard it got some bad reviews but I quite enjoyed it.
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| ? posted by Orpheus |
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there isn't enuff room on this page to write down all our books... between 5 of our top readers, it would be about 5,000 books i would venture that i alone have read close to 2,000 |
Its not a race Orph, just a friendly chate about what we like to read!
[addsig]Apart from academic reading.....
The last book I read was "Miss Smilla's feeling for snow" by Peter Hoeg. I'd started on "The glass bead game" by Herman Hesse, but now I need to read The Royal Geographical Society's "Expedition Medicine" instead, in order to be prepared for my wilderness medical training courses
And ReNo - much respect! I've never had the patience to take on "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms".
Some of the recent ones i've read (within the last ten days or so)
Still reading the last one... Nothing of too much quality except Third World war and The Message of the Upanishads
| ? posted by matt | ||
Its not a race Orph, just a friendly chate about what we like to read! |
race?
can't have a race with one participant 
especially since i have been reading since about age 10..
be funny seeing most of you compete from the zygote stage 
)
*laughs at Reno over the rugby*
Uh, recently... don't have much time to read really but I'm a big sci-fi fan. Trying to get through Robert Reed's latest book- 'Marrow' was a great book. I think Neal Asher is my favourite author right now- 'Line Of Polity' and 'Skinner' are also worth checking out!- he has a great, realistic and rich futuristic universe, and I can't wait for his next book. Also like Alastair Reynolds and Peter Hamilton (hopefully 'Pandoras Star' is better than his last book about a treatment for ageing, too much teenage sex going on 
)
| ? posted by Monqui |
| Recent schtuff: The Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger |
One book I can truely say I hated - I just couldn't stand the central characters constant whining.
[addsig]in the past 3 months, i have read about 6 trek books, and 2-3 book sets from from forgotten realms..
i go through phases, for a while, i cannot touch a book, none seem interesting, then all of a sudden i must read.. and it will last for a while.
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Would you like required:
Heart of Darkness
Hard times
Doctor Faustus
King Lear
Whithering Heights
(all not so good as what I actually like to read)
or free time:
Harry Potter (yes I know Im falling into what everyone else likes, but it still good reading)
Lord of the Rings (I read the whole series at least once a year)
and currently working on Aragon (nothing pertaining to LOR)
And those are just for the past few months (apox: 3).
The last two books I read were:
White Jazz - James Ellroy (big crime writer, did the book "L.A. Confidential", later made famous by a certain K. Spacey..)
White Trash - John King - interesting novel/socio-political commentary, a general look at todays disaffected youths and society (in the UK) through two main characters running parallel in the book, linked by one main thing...
very very good books both of them are, White Jazz is a little trying at times with its interspersal of chapters devoted to newspapers columns and entire dialect "sequences". Great all the same 
Hmm, I don't have any time to read while I'm in school, but here are some favorite authors and books.
David Webber- sci fi; Honor Harington series
George R.R. Martin- Fantasy; The song of ice and fire series
H.G. Wells; War of the worlds; island of Dr. Morau... ect.
Tom Clancy's original books. (they suck after and marginaly including Rainbow Six)
Michael Chrighton- Prey is absolutly fantastic, though it gets a bit rediculas towards the end.
Robert Jordon- The wheel of time; unfortunatly this series seems to have stalled badly
there really are too many to list.
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/me heads down to the book vault...
You sure you really want me to list this book collection? Lep might not have enough bandwidth.
Basically, almost every Forgotten Realms book(most of them I've read at least 4 times). The Wheel of Time series. All books by Raymond E. Feist. The Death Gate series. And a s**tload of other unconnected books.
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Well, the most recent thing I've read for fun was Batman: The Long Halloween...
As for real books, I recently read four different books about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Fun?
Recent pieces I've been mulling through:
The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Finally got my hands on this over Christmas Break
The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens - He really has this unique intellectual approach to poetry
The Comic Toolbox by John Vorhaus - I'd say this is easily the definitive comedy writing book, certainly the best of the handful I've gotten my hands on. Kind of a specific taste though.
Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut - Most of the way through this book and I gotta say it really is an odd duckling. Between the "tell it like it is" tone, interspersed drawings, and actual interaction between the author and his creations as such - it's a mindf**k and a half.
Re..ree...read?
Reading these forums is plenty for me
I prefer day dreaming or just reading my academic books on architecture, they tend to be really interesting.
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I just finished Carl Sagan's Dragons of Eden. Great book about the evolution of human intelligence and some other relevant topics. He presents a lot of interesting theories and it's a very easy read, I'd highly recommend it for anyone interested in some very basic neurobiology.
I'm starting Aristotle's The Politics now, and up next will probably be Plato's The Republic. I'm starting to think I should have read these in the opposite order, as Aristotle seems to spend a lot of time arguing against components of The Republic.
| ? posted by Leperous |
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*laughs at Reno over the rugby* |
Bah, you guys are the world champions, we weren't exactly expecting to do as well as we did thank you very much
Tracer, I've read a few of Clancy's older books, but personally prefer his newer ones. Perhaps I made bad choices from them in the past though. I've read Netforce (and oh dear god, I saw the film...must....forget....the film!) and a couple in another series called "Op Centre" or something? Been a while since I read those however. I found Rainbox Six to be the best of them, and Teeth of the Tiger to be better than the earlier ones.
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