Books: What have you been reading?

[Expletive Deleted]

Since the Books forum is gone, I thought I'd restart this thread, albeit with a slightly less in-jokey name.

I've been reading Christopher Moore's Serpent of Venice, a sequel to Fool. It's a riff on Othello and Merchant of Venice, featuring a disreputable court jester commenting on and meddling in the action. It's fun, but a little overstuffed. Fool was just based on King Lear (the lead character in both books is Lear's Fool), but Serpent tries to pack in too much. There's even an extended Poe sequence. It's far from essential, but for a Moore fan or a Shakespeare buff, it's worth a look.

Anyone else read any good prose, lately?

[Postmania]

Reading "Little America", a book about the afghanistan war. It's pretty interesting so far. The author did the book "Imperial life in the Emerald City" as well, which was also good.

[Action Ace]

War: What is it Good For? by Ian Morris and His Ownself: A Semi-Memoir by Dan Jenkins are the two books I'm currently reading.

Last book I read was How the West Won: The Neglected Story of the Triumph of Modernity by Rodney Stark.

[Zeb]

Re-reading the Sandman series. Got a sub for the current lot... but felt like a refresh.

[Bradley]

I just recently finished re-reading Joan Didion's The White Album, Ralph Ellison's "Battle Royal," and essays by George Orwell, John D'Agata, Theodor Adorno, and E.J. Levy about the essay as a literary form. These were all things I was teaching. My summer reading list-- to start next week!-- includes the collected short stories of Flannery O'Connor and Joan Didion's nonfiction work from the 80s and 90.

[Arvandor]

Its been ages since I've read an actual book (one without pictures). I really need to make time for it again some day.

[Matt]

I've been reading The Great Book of Ignorance, or a title to such effect, based on the QI TV show hosted by Stephen Fry - lots of myths, stories, etc explained and what-not.
Some of it is absolutely fascinating reading and destroyed some of the ideas I had stuck in my head.

[steverogers]

Its been ages since I've read an actual book (one without pictures). I really need to make time for it again some day.

Same here, although lately I have been reading 'Dr No' by Ian Fleming off and on...

[invitewed]

Reading "Little America", a book about the afghanistan war. It's pretty interesting so far. The author did the book "Imperial life in the Emerald City" as well, which was also good.

An excellent look at the involvement of the U.S. in Afghanistan in the last few years – particularly since the Obama administration took over in 2009.

[The Darknight Detective]

New book: The Gods Themselves (1972) by Isaac Asimov.

[Jim Kelly]

I finished MIDDLEMARCH last week and I was very proud of myself. Back in the 1980s, George Eliot's THE MILL ON THE FLOSS was on the reading list for a university course and I struggled. In fact, I never read the whole thing, just skimmed it, and had to fake it when we discussed the novel in class. I've had MIDDLEMARCH on my bookshelf for a good thirty years and always feared cracking it open. But during the pandemic I've gotten around to reading books I've had for a long time and never read, so I thought I'd give MIDDLEMARCH a go. It was tough--as I wrote to a friend, you could time an egg on how long it takes to get from the beginning of a sentence to the end--but once I got into it, I read it fairly quickly (for someone of my slow reading speed).

I didn't like how a few of the characters ended up. She does that thing in the finale where she tells you what happened to them later in life--and I don't think the novel needed that. Once a writer has told their story, they need to get out and let readers imagine for themselves where the characters could go from there.

[The Darknight Detective]

I finished MIDDLEMARCH last week and I was very proud of myself. Back in the 1980s, George Eliot's THE MILL ON THE FLOSS was on the reading list for a university course and I struggled. In fact, I never read the whole thing, just skimmed it, and had to fake it when we discussed the novel in class. I've had MIDDLEMARCH on my bookshelf for a good thirty years and always feared cracking it open. But during the pandemic I've gotten around to reading books I've had for a long time and never read, so I thought I'd give MIDDLEMARCH a go. It was tough--as I wrote to a friend, you could time an egg on how long it takes to get from the beginning of a sentence to the end--but once I got into it, I read it fairly quickly (for someone of my slow reading speed).

I didn't like how a few of the characters ended up. She does that thing in the finale where she tells you what happened to them later in life--and I don't think the novel needed that. Once a writer has told their story, they need to get out and let readers imagine for themselves where the characters could go from there.

The only Eliot I have read is Adam Bede, which I would recommend (though she does that thing you don't like at the end )

[saul_on_the_road_to_damascus]

I've read a bunch of books so far this year.
Syrup and Company from Max Berry
Panic by Lauren Oliver
Everyday by David Levithan
Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan
Me Since You by Laura Weiss
Red Rising by Pierce Brown
Half Bad by Sally Green
Allegiant by Veronica Roth
The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult
Missing You by Harlan Coban
the Strain by Chuck Hogan and Guillermo Del Toro

Currently reading the Fall (sequal to the strain)

[saul_on_the_road_to_damascus]

I've read a bunch of books so far this year.
Syrup and Company from Max Berry
Panic by Lauren Oliver
Everyday by David Levithan
Mr. Penumbra's 24 Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan
Me Since You by Laura Weiss
Red Rising by Pierce Brown
Half Bad by Sally Green
Allegiant by Veronica Roth
The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult
Missing You by Harlan Coban
the Strain by Chuck Hogan and Guillermo Del Toro

Currently reading the Fall (sequal to the strain)

So I left my copy of the Fall at home the other day so I picked up
Just one Day
and
JUST one Year by Gayle Forman author of a few books I read two summers ago. Both were very good if you like the teen romance genre (think sisterhood of the traveling pants not gossip girl.

[Deathstroke]

I finished reading the Jussi Adler-Olsen novel The Keeper of Lost Causes today. Really liked it a lot.