what ya reading? Version XXXIVXXX

[troutman]

Originally Posted by Flamescupbound!

I've been on an anti-utopia binge lately. Just finished "We" by Yevgeny Zamyatin. Incredible read, but not for the casual reader. Starting Huxley's "Brave New World". I've heard that this is the best anti-utopia out there, even surpassing Orwell's 1984 in greatness.

Sounds like my SF & Fan literature course at UWO. I actually got credit for reading all these books. You might also enjoy The Sheep Look Up, A Cantilce For Liebowitz, and Handmaid's Tale.

[Burninator]

Originally Posted by Flamescupbound!

I've been on an anti-utopia binge lately. Just finished "We" by Yevgeny Zamyatin. Incredible read, but not for the casual reader. Starting Huxley's "Brave New World". I've heard that this is the best anti-utopia out there, even surpassing Orwell's 1984 in greatness.

I believe it is called dystopia. Anyways I would recommend Handmaids tale too, I liked Oryx and Crake by Atwood aswell. I've also heard that Fahrenheit 451 is good (an easy read) also Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut. This is one of my favourite genres, I wish there were more novels out there for it. Maybe I'm just not looking in the right places.

[liamenator]

Originally Posted by socalwingfan

Typical Welsh, lots of sex, drugs and corruption. It definitely lives up to the title - very sick and twisted story. I don't think it's a book you want to introduce yourself to Welsh but if you've read his other books you will probably like it.

Yep.. bang on. It's out there, even for Welsh... Took me a while to get into it but I enjoyed it when all was said and done.

[liamenator]

Originally Posted by simonsays

If you like that you should consider picking up The Corrections by Jonathen Franzen, or Mr. Sandman by Barbara Gowdy. Although you might want to read something a little less John Irvingy in between them.

Yeah, i read The Corrections a few years ago... another one I couldn't put down. Depressing as hell but weirdly engaging. One of my favorites.

I'll have to pick up Mr. Sandman though, thanks!

[kermitology]

For those who read Collapse, what did you think of it?

I've just finished the Maya chapter and I'm finding it... OK. He writes really well and is detailed, but I kind of find it rambling. I wish he'd get to the point a little more often.

Not really sure what's up next for me. I might finish The World is Flat. I got fed up with the low level bull**** that Freidmen spreads on. It makes me angry because I feel like he's talking down to me.

[simonsays]

Originally Posted by SeeGeeWhy

Reading through Collapse by Jared Diamond right now. It's taken me a while to get through it, but it is certainly very eye opening. It is basically an examination of a number of case studies where a society failed and tries to find the common thread between them. He discovers there are many reasons, but basically 5 major things that happen to cause the collapse of a society. Its been a very educational read so far and it definitely scares me a bit. I'd recommend it.

I hate to ruin the end of Collapse for ya, but they cut down all the trees. Easter Island, cut down all the trees - Pitcairn, cut down all the trees - Anasazi - didn't have enough trees to begin with, Maya - trees, Iceland - trees (and cattle), Greenland - cut down the trees (oh and they didn't actually eat any fish, but the real culprit here is the freaking trees), Rwanda - overpopulation and lack of good sturdy trees, Haiti/Dominican Republic - well one of those two countries cut down all their trees.

That's as far as I could get, I found Prof. Diamonds conclusions rather unsatisfactory. Although until I had figured out the theme I rather enjoyed the Easter, Greenland and Pitcairn sections.

[TheCommodoreAfro]

Two books right now - Steven Johnson's Everything Bad is Good for You (a look at pop culture and how games, TV, etc help, not hinder your brain and make us smarter) and Philip Roth's American Pastoral, which is quickly becoming one of my favourite books of all time. I have a forty minute train ride in the morning so I get a lot of reading done.

[Antithesis]

Recently finished Fight Club, am now reading Hockey: A People's History.

[RW99]

Rainbow Six by Tom Clancy. Third time reading it in 3 or 4 years, haven't been able to find a better one

[Kipru]

The art of blacksmithing by Alex W. Bealer. Just loking for some inspiration to fire up my forge.

[housejunk]

Originally Posted by simonsays

I hate to ruin the end of Collapse for ya, but they cut down all the trees. Easter Island, cut down all the trees - Pitcairn, cut down all the trees - Anasazi - didn't have enough trees to begin with, Maya - trees, Iceland - trees (and cattle), Greenland - cut down the trees (oh and they didn't actually eat any fish, but the real culprit here is the freaking trees), Rwanda - overpopulation and lack of good sturdy trees, Haiti/Dominican Republic - well one of those two countries cut down all their trees.

That's as far as I could get, I found Prof. Diamonds conclusions rather unsatisfactory. Although until I had figured out the theme I rather enjoyed the Easter, Greenland and Pitcairn sections.

Collapse......wow, what an unsufferably boring book. I have yet to meet a single person who actually enjoyed it. I thought Guns, Germs and Steel was a fairly interesting read but Collapse.....yikes. It seemed to me the only reason Collapse was written, was because the publisher pushed Diamond to turn the most interesting anecdotes from GGS (ie the parts regarding the collapse of the Mayan civilization) into a full length book. It's repetitive and actually quite annoying. It could have been a fasinating, interesting read, but instead turns into a soapbox which only 2nd year anthro majors could truly love.

[Buff]

Conqueror's Heritage - Book 2 of the Conquerors Trilogy by Timothy Zahn. It is a science fiction series that I decided to read after I thoroughly enjoyed each of Timothy Zahn's Star Wars books. So far this trilogy hasn't disappointed me.

[Resolute 14]

Flipping between the book for my A+ certification, and reading the entire Xanth series start to finish - 29 books in all. It's just about the lightest fantasy ever written, however, so easy to get through.

[CaramonLS]

The Night Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko.

[Kybosh]

On the road - Jack Kerouac

[J pold]

One that always comes up in these threads is “Catch-22” so I bought it and tried my damndest to get into, but I just can’t no matter how hard I try

[Bobblehead]

The fantasy series "Songs of Fire and Ice" by George RR Martin has had its broadcast rights purchased by HBO. link

The series will begin with the 1996 first book, "A Game of Thrones," and the intention is for each novel (they average 1,000 pages each) to fuel a season's worth of episodes. Martin has nearly finished the fifth installment, but won't complete the seven-book cycle until 2011.

[Bench Warmer]

Just finished reading 'Between a Rock and a Hard Place' by Aron Ralston - it's the story of Aron who had to cut his arm off after he got it caught hiking in Utah a few years back. I'm not a hiker or outdoorsy at all but it was pretty good.

I'm in the middle of Golf and Life by Jack Nicklaus and this Dr. John something. It's brutal - the chapters by Jack are okay but the Dr. John parts are horrible. He comes up with the simplest concepts a 3rd grader could've came up with and thinks they're the greatest thing since sliced bread. He's terrible.

[@theCBE]

How the Scots Invented the Modern World by Arthur Herman
just started it but its not bad... its pretty cool because it mentions some historic events (by Scottish standards) that happened about 5 minutes walk away from my front door

[Ro]

Originally Posted by J pold

One that always comes up in these threads is “Catch-22” so I bought it and tried my damndest to get into, but I just can’t no matter how hard I try

Easily in my top 5 books of all-time. I recommend that book to everyone when this topic comes up, even if everybody has heard of it.

I am also reading "The God Delusion" by Richard Dawkins. Starting to believe that I am in fact an atheist, and not simply an agnostic. Brilliant read so far- Dawkins is one of those writers who makes scientific non-fiction read like fiction in a way. So yeah, I recommend that one too.

Also picked up SuperFoods RX (or something like that). Reading all about blueberries and flaxseed and spinach and salmon. Yum.

As far as poker books go, "Read 'Em And Reap" is tremendous. Read through it a few times and it instantly made me a better live player. It was simply amazing to see all these behaviors at the poker table that you see every time and be able to identify and categorize them, and then act accordingly. You're really doing yourself a disservice as a poker player if you don't read it.