What are you reading at the moment?

[yowser]

Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica - Isaac Newton

 

[SimonDoom]

Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica - Isaac Newton

There's nothing like a little light beach reading to bring a smile to the face.

 

[lovecraft68]

Re-reading The Devil's Kiss by William Johnstone, a High priest and priestess of the devil convert a small town into their cult...not a book to take serious, but it features some seriously perverted and detailed sex scenes, one of the reviews on it calls it "glorious trash"

I'd agree

 

[Payne_Hall]

Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica - Isaac Newton

Dear God, do you have a gun to your head? Atlas Shrugged was a quicker read than that was.

 

[MetaBob]

Tacitus - Agricola

Among a whole bunch of other things. Didn't know that happened? Well, few others have yet, either. I mean, not really, though at least a couple historians have gone on record. Because two thousand years ago, Tacitus was like the only person there who could read and/or write. I mean, aside from Agricola, and Domitia Decidiana, and Julia, there's not much (if anything?) from anyone else there who could.

I would be very happy to be directed to a place where I'm proven wrong.

Meanwhile, jeez, what fun stories could come from a placetime whence many stories come, but none are verifiable?

 

[yowser]

Dear God, do you have a gun to your head? Atlas Shrugged was a quicker read than that was.

You are 100% correct.

But a writer often has to read to do story research, yes? The Geek Pride challenge made me do it.

 

[RichardWark]

Mike Nichols: A Life
By Mark Harris

Possibly the best biography I have ever read.

 

[Lori_the_Hoosier]

The Country Diary Of An Edwardian Lady

Edith Holden

 

[SimonDoom]

Henry James, The Beast In The Jungle.

 

[KeithD]

Just finished Sax Rohmer's Island of Fu-Manchu and starting to read Martin Walker's The Resistance Man.

 

[BiscuitHammer]

Rubiyat, by Omar Khayam. This copy I have was a bday present, it was printed in 1923. Very precious to me, with lovely illustrations. Gotta love Sufi poetry.

 

[KeithD]

Rutland Place, by Anne Perry

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91KmZoUQqQL._AC_UY327_FMwebp_QL65_.jpg



The Resistance Man, by Martin Walker

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81RZSuHAB-L._AC_UY327_FMwebp_QL65_.jpg

 

[Lori_the_Hoosier]

Arthurian Legends Of the Middle Ages by George Cox & Eustace Jones

 

[SimonDoom]

I'm in a Henry James phase. Now reading his story The Jolly Corner. Soon I'll resume reading Neal Stephenson's Anathem.

 

[Lifestyle66]

I love a good book, and I'd like to know what the rest of you are reading. So please tell me, what are you reading at the moment?

This was a trick question. At this moment I'm reading the Literotica Discussion Board.

 

[Jackie.Hikaru]

Out by Natsuo Kirino. Highly recommended if you like crime thrillers. My next read will be a regular Halloween fare - Silence of the Lamb. So excited

 

[KeithD]

Several posters have noted they have John LeCarre on their reading lists. If they have not read his The Pigeon Tunnel (published in 2106), which I'm reading now, they should. This is a collection of vignettes through his life that illuminate his own background and on the writing of many of his novels--an added dimension in enjoying his novels.

He writes that at one time or other all of his novels had the working title "The Pigeon Tunnel" and he explains what that is. There are tunnels leading toward the sea from under the casino in Monaco. At one time, they raised caged pigeons on the roof of the casino and, for sport, they'd release pigeons in the tunnels to fly out to the sea near a gun club. As they flew out of the tunnels, gun club members would use them for targets. Being pigeons, if they survived that, they homed back to the cages at the top of the casino do go through the cycle all over again. LeCarre thought that was appropriately reflective of the world of spying.

 

[Lori_the_Hoosier]

At the moment I'm reading my husband's 4x Great-Grandmother's kitchen book, looking for inspiration and wallowing in all her recipes and acerbic little notes to the kitchen maids in her own copperplate hand on how long to stir, baste, steam, stuff, or broil, detailed instructions on how she liked her rabbits and hares skinned, her own recipes for aspic and fruit jellies, cakes and steamed puddings, ice creams and set milk puddings, and explicit instructions on things like how to confit a duck or jug a hare. A lot of the recipes are far too rich to attempt today, I certainly wouldn't like to attempt (or even eat...) some of them, especially the roast duck in chocolate and duck-blood sauce, stuffed sheep's head, Kedgeree, pig's head cheese terrined in aspic, and Raized Pie (Turducken). Fascinating stuff, if a little stomach churning. I liked the duck in orange sauce, that was a taste revelation, but I draw the line at a sauce made from cooked duck blood and chocolate; some foods deserve to die out...

Some of the recipes are kind of bizarre by modern standards, truly nauseated by the idea of duck in chocolate and duck-blood sauce, others wouldn't look out of place on the menu at 'The Ivy', and they go all way the up to the late 1880's or thereabouts, which is when the old girl died. She was 15 when she married, in 1824, so I suspect a lot of the recipes in the front part of the book were from her own mother and grandmother, so probably from the latter half of the 18th century. It must have been strange for a girl so young to become mistress of her own house at such a young age, but apparently she rose to the challenge magnificently; hubby's family records seem to hold her in awe and not a little fear; the story is that she was quite a dragon in her old age, but I suppose in Victorian times, at the pinnacle of empire, where the menfolk were usually off somewhere in the world fighting and dying in the endless wars Britain was embroiled in, that was only to be expected.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

"The Cat Who Walked Through Walls" by R. A. Heinlein.

ETA: Just finished this last night (3/5/22). I really didn't like the ending although I have read it before and from what I remember didn't have a problem with the ending. So, now it on to the next in the series that's not really a series just to see what happens. It's been a lot of years since I have read any of his books. A long, long, long time.

 

[SimonDoom]

Genome, by Matt Ridley.

 

[Emirus]

I’m reading Ghost Boy the autobiography of Martin Pistorius (No connection with the infamous Oscar Pistorius) which must rate as one of the best stories about a person’s struggle against being, for unsolved reasons, cocooned in a physical condition where he’s unable to communicate in any way and his body doesn’t obey his instructions.

It’s one of the most inspiring stories I’ve ever heard of let alone read of someone overcoming, although not completely, a situation in which the phrase “never wish it on my worst enemy” could rightly be used.

 

[PennameWombat]

“Language Families of the World” by John McWhorter, audio book. Which is good, because we get his attempts to pronounce click languages and many others. Although he sometimes uses recordings of native speakers.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

“Language Families of the World” by John McWhorter, audio book. Which is good, because we get his attempts to pronounce click languages and many others. Although he sometimes uses recordings of native speakers.

I haven't read his books yet (I keep trying to get them through the library and keep being disappointed). But occasionally writes columns for The Atlantic, and I enjoy those.

 

[SimonDoom]

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

I read that a long time ago and enjoyed it, but I came away from it feeling somewhat disturbed. She's a strange author. She has talent, but she likes writing novels from the standpoint of emotionally stunted and morally bereft young men, which is an interesting choice for POV characters.

I liked that novel more than her Pulitzer Prize winner, The Goldfinch, although it has many similarities to Secret History. If you like The Secret History and haven't read The Goldfinch, you probably should give it a try.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

I read that a long time ago and enjoyed it, but I came away from it feeling somewhat disturbed. She's a strange author. She has talent, but she likes writing novels from the standpoint of emotionally stunted and morally bereft young men, which is an interesting choice for POV characters.

I liked that novel more than her Pulitzer Prize winner, The Goldfinch, although it has many similarities to Secret History. If you like The Secret History and haven't read The Goldfinch, you probably should give it a try.

I actually read The Goldfinch first.

Then I read a couple less dense books (Dark Places by Gillian Flynn, and The Girl Upstairs [I can't remember the author] which was basically a Gillian Flynn knockoff) while waiting for Secret History to become available.

I found The Goldfinch more compelling, in that "this is a really interesting character, and I need to read more" from the beginning. But the epic timeline of that book (it's what 15-20 years?) and the circuitous plot kind of wore me out in the end.

So far, Secret History seems to be moving faster, without as many detours to set up later events.

What I've been drawn to so far is the way she draws the characters. She lets their actions (mostly) speak for themselves, without neon signs about their motivations.