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Posted
On 11/14/2024 at 10:40 PM, safe sex said:

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The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (and much more) from the perspective of Jim. And after finishing this horrific and hilarious novel, it feels wrong to call him Jim. He's James.

Read Twain and follow it immediately with Everett. Fantastic literature. They complete one another in many ways, and I'm not sure I'll ever read one without the other again.

I see it won the National Book Award for fiction.  How necessary is reading Huckleberry Finn before?  

Posted
2 hours ago, Nigel Tufnel said:

I see it won the National Book Award for fiction.  How necessary is reading Huckleberry Finn before?  

If you haven't read Huckleberry Finn in a while and don't remember a lot of the intricacies of the plot (I was amazed by how much of the story I had forgotten), then I strongly recommend rereading it prior to James. I say that only because my experience was much the richer for it. It's probably fine to not.

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Posted (edited)
On 10/14/2024 at 6:01 PM, mdmost said:

I thought this was fantastic. It could easily have been a Netflix or HBO documentary. The sheer balls of this guy and his girlfriend to steal works of art from multiple museums in Europe, mostly spur of the moment thefts with little planning, was amazing to read about. This was an instance of a book cover catching my eye and leading to an enjoyable reading experience.


Next is one I've been putting off due to its high page count but I'm hoping it's an enthralling read and not a slog. I would assume it's good as lots of Best Of list have it on there.

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I finally got through The Demon of Unrest tonight after stopping it after 100 pages a month ago. I just hit a wall with it and had to pivot to a different book so I picked up a book about Lana Turner's boyfriend's mysterious murder in the 1950s. I had a trip to LA planned and wanted something center around the Golden Age of Hollywood. It did the trick. Came home and it got me through the fog and I was able to make it through the rest of The Demon of Unrest this month. I can see why it was on a lot of Best of lists. It's really really good. Makes me want to take a visit to Charleston and filled a void I had in my superficial knowledge about the lead up to and start of the Civil War. I'll have to pick up more Erik Larson books in 2025. I know my wife was a huge fan of The Devil in the White City and we own The Splendid and the Vile. 

I was very excited to hear that Ron Chernow will have out a new biography in 2025 about Mark Twain. I tore through his Hamilton and Washington biographies. Grant's was too much of trudge and I never finished it. Comes out in March.

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Edited by mdmost
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Posted
On 12/17/2024 at 10:54 PM, mdmost said:

I finally got through The Demon of Unrest tonight after stopping it after 100 pages a month ago. I just hit a wall with it and had to pivot to a different book so I picked up a book about Lana Turner's boyfriend's mysterious murder in the 1950s. I had a trip to LA planned and wanted something center around the Golden Age of Hollywood. It did the trick. Came home and it got me through the fog and I was able to make it through the rest of The Demon of Unrest this month. I can see why it was on a lot of Best of lists. It's really really good. Makes me want to take a visit to Charleston and filled a void I had in my superficial knowledge about the lead up to and start of the Civil War. I'll have to pick up more Erik Larson books in 2025. I know my wife was a huge fan of The Devil in the White City and we own The Splendid and the Vile. 

I was very excited to hear that Ron Chernow will have out a new biography in 2025 about Mark Twain. I tore through his Hamilton and Washington biographies. Grant's was too much of trudge and I never finished it. Comes out in March.

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Dead wake for the submarine storyline is great stuff, the storyline of the ppl on the ship was kinda meh. Garden of beasts is worth a read in these times we’re living through. 

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Posted (edited)

Cross-posted from the dog thread

I just finished reading this book, about an English Pointer named Judy. It chronicles her fascinating life, which began on the streets of Shanghai just before WWII and continues as she becomes the mascot on board an English gunboat on the Yangtze River, her three years as a POW (the only canine officially recognized as a POW) in a brutal Japanese camp in Sumatra, and her eventual liberation along with the English airman that she bonded with in the POW camp. Judy survived the sinking of two ships, once by Japanese bombs and once by torpedo from an English submarine.  She was also wounded in action. If you can finish this without it getting dusty, then you aren't really a dog lover.

 

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Edited by NeverMarryAStripper
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Posted

Los Moneros de México (Rius 2004.)

Mexican cartoonists from 1820s to 2004, done by and for cartoonists.

Each page would be worth a Master's degree of study to fully understand, or, like me, you can just admire the technique and look at the funny pictures.

Got it in a tiny bookstore on an Acuña sidestreet when I was prowling for a different book. Glad I found this one instead.

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Posted
On 12/30/2024 at 2:44 AM, NeverMarryAStripper said:

Cross-posted from the dog thread

I just finished reading this book, about an English Pointer named Judy. It chronicles her fascinating life, which began on the streets of Shanghai just before WWII and continues as she becomes the mascot on board an English gunboat on the Yangtze River, her three years as a POW (the only canine officially recognized as a POW) in a brutal Japanese camp in Sumatra, and her eventual liberation along with the English airman that she bonded with in the POW camp. Judy survived the sinking of two ships, once by Japanese bombs and once by torpedo from an English submarine.  She was also wounded in action. If you can finish this without it getting dusty, then you aren't really a dog lover.

 

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Nope. I'm tearing up at just the description. Ain't happening.

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Posted
44 minutes ago, TonyTexas said:

^^^
User name seems apropos as your nails look like you work in a cane field. 

Spent yesterday toiling in the south 0.05 acres wiring in a fence breech. Wild animal highway, and Dog now knows that she can escape-artist out of there.

Until she rammed up against the New Reality.

Posted
On 12/3/2024 at 9:59 AM, SimonBolivar said:

I realized that I had never read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer or The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn before so I'm reading both before James

Have you made any headway?

Posted

Largely about early American ornithology in general, as opposed to just the birds that slipped by unnoticed. What they lacked in optics in the early 1800s, they made up for in guns and staggering amounts of wildlife that I truly can't even imagine today.

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Posted
I realized that I had never read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer or The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn before so I'm reading both before James

I read both in middle school but just decided to listen to the audiobook of Huck Finn in preparation for reading James. I found it incredibly dull and boring, not to mention the frequent use of the N-word, which of course it was a different time but it was still a beating to listen to. So glad that one is finally behind me. Thanks for nothing, Mark Twain.
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Posted (edited)

I picked this up on a recommendation from I believe @mdmost? It's a real page-turner, not just because it's captivating, but also because large print was the only option at the library. I feel like a speed reader.

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Edited by hookem2010
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Posted

Yes. That and Nuclear War: A Scenario by Annie Jacobsen were my two favorite books from last year.

This one that was on my list last year but I felt this was a better month to try it. 

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Posted
1 hour ago, Post Oak said:

Agreed. Really enjoyed it. I have a couple more Hampton Sides books on my list that I haven't cracked open yet.

I've read Blood and Thunder (years ago) and On Desperate Ground last year. Very easy to read, compared to some non-fiction.

Posted

This one has been on my list and I finally decided to get to it.  I've read one of his other books "The March" that I liked ok.

This is an interesting book.  Set in NY in 1906 it features a ton of famous people like Harry Houdini, JP Morgan Henry Ford. 

The story weaves it's way through their lives as well as some lesser known "celebrities". 

He writes in short chapters which I appreciate.  It doesn't really drag.  It's good but I'm kind of ambivalent towards it.  It's an easy read.

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Posted

Just finished Annals of the Former World, John McPhee’s Pulitzer Prize winning collection of five books on the geology of North America.  While sounding dry as toast, it is very readable.  Simply amazing history of our world, along with biographies of impactful geologists who contributed greatly to knowledge of North America’s Deep Time.  The middle book, Rising from the Plains, about Wyoming geology and Dr. David Love were my personal favorite.  David Love, and especially his parents, led lives that few of us can even imagine.

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Posted
1 hour ago, billfromlaketravis said:

Thank you. Any recent mob books you’d recommend? 

Check out some of TJ English’ books. He writes about a lot of non-Italian organized crime. Irish, Cubans, Asian, South Florida cocaine. Good stuff. 

Posted
3 minutes ago, TonyTexas said:

Check out some of TJ English’ books. He writes about a lot of non-Italian organized crime. Irish, Cubans, Asian, South Florida cocaine. Good stuff. 

Way ahead of you. Already read the Westies and the Cuban book. I’m listening on the Asian gangs and Florida cocaine trade books. 
 

The recent Purple Gang and NJ books are pretty good. 
 

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Posted

World Within a Song, Jeff Tweedy (2023) (audio)

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Continuing the Wilco readings.  I enjoyed the audiobook more, but this has some nice bits.  Really a thankyou ode to all the folks he listened to on his headphones growing up, and those to come.

It's fun when he hits stuff that you have strong feelings about or memories.  Bit's I liked where the CBGB toilet, his thoughts on The Weight on the last waltz, and one great story about meeting a childhood friend.

Music and life affirming. 

Posted
On 9/7/2018 at 5:02 PM, Fudge Nuggets said:

Prior to Astroball I read this:

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It took me forever to finish it, but that was because I never had a lot of time to sit down and read it for an extended period at a time - not because it wasn't good.  It is a great book and anyone interested in the subject should get it.

 

On 9/30/2018 at 10:01 PM, demos said:

We'll see how far I make it in the series; started book 2 and went ahead and got book 3.

Just finished this one:

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Timely read and interesting thesis.

I added both to my audible library, gonna give them a listen and see if they stick.

Posted

Had forgotten about this thread until that quote.

Finished this one recently:

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And finally pulled this off the shelf. Bought it when I was reading a lot about Central/Latin America and then I veered into some other subject before getting around to it:

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Posted

Reading a book for class right now. Really interesting book about the end of the Pacific War. The writer is a retired professor from Cal-Berkeley and a friend of one of my professors. If Robert Citino finds this book to be an important part of the history of the war then so do I. Got quite a bit of material from the Soviet archives that writers during the Cold War, and many years after that,  never had access to. 
 

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