Last Book You Read....

[tongue_tied_danny]

I'm working my way through The Eastern Front 1914-17 by Norman Stone.

It's quite good with a lot of detail but it can be a bit dry in places. That's not a valid criticism by the way as I don't expect a non fiction book about a bloody conflict to be a barrel of laughs.

I've always felt that most English language books and documentaries about ww1 have focused primarily on the western front while largely ignoring other theatres so I'm keen to study more about what went on elsewhere. 

[welshbairn]

2 minutes ago, tongue_tied_danny said:

I'm working my way through The Eastern Front 1914-17 by Norman Stone.

It's quite good with a lot of detail but it can be a bit dry in places. That's not a valid criticism by the way as I don't expect a non fiction book about a bloody conflict to be a barrel of laughs.

I've always felt that most English language books and documentaries about ww1 have focused primarily on the western front while largely ignoring other theatres so I'm keen to study more about what went on elsewhere. 

If you haven't read them, Anthony Beevor's Stalingrad, and Berlin: the Downfall, are a right riveting read.

[tongue_tied_danny]

22 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

If you haven't read them, Anthony Beevor's Stalingrad, and Berlin: the Downfall, are a right riveting read.

I've read them both and you're correct. They are excellent.

I've also read Enemy at the Gates by William Craig, another Stalingrad book that is every bit as good as the one by Anthony Beevor.

[Duszek]

Independence Day by Richard Ford - magnificent.

 

[coprolite]

On 02/04/2020 at 01:04, Moomintroll said:

On 30/03/2020 at 11:50, moniton said:

Just reading Good Omens, I enjoyed the tv show and thought I would give the book a chance. It’s an enjoyable enough way to kill some lockdown downtime, and was only £4 in Asda.
Have decided when that is finished to reacquaint myself with my favourite book of all time Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy. He has that American habit of using a paragraph when a couple of sentences would do but all is forgiven when you lose yourself in his books. Imagine a tale of the opening up of the American west but told by an Old Testament preacher- genius. Looking forward to it as you may guess.

Open yourself up to all of Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett's other books, I have read them all & they will not disappoint.

Is Neil Gaiman similar to Pratchett? How would you describe his stuff? 

[Duszek]

On 02/04/2020 at 01:42, Miguel Sanchez said:

The New York Trilogy by Paul Auster

When I was 21 I read this - among other things - and decided I wanted to write crime books. Given this is a post-modern collection of stories which might or might not be about the same person, or the author, who might be a character in all of them or at least himself, and the descent into madness and death by nearly everyone involved, I have a reasonable idea of why that summer went the way it did.

Ah, Peter Stillman.

My end-of-year essay during my Paris Erasmus exchange was a rant about the impossibility of nomenclaure to capture identity, citing this book as proof. I got an A - the professor was an American hippy. Great times.

[bishopburn boy]

30 minutes ago, coprolite said:

Is Neil Gaiman similar to Pratchett? How would you describe his stuff? 

Gaiman is “darker” than Pratchett, generally but his stuff is really good  dig out  American gods , it’s fantastic , 

[WhiteRoseKillie]

Is Neil Gaiman similar to Pratchett? How would you describe his stuff? 

As said above, Gaiman can certainly be a lot darker than Pratchett, with quite a lot of adult-level sex and violence in places. Weird sex, at that..
I would say, also, that Gaiman is more likely to take a left turn mid story.

[DiegoDiego]

This is an old one but worth posting. Somebody writing the plot of Home Alone in the style of Cormac McCarthy.

https://www.theawl.com/2015/12/the-home/

[topcat(The most tip top)]

Confessions of a sinner by Saint Augustine

A bit too more religion than I’d usually like and not quite enough sin but a decent read nonetheless

[Raidernation]

I started the History of Scotland by Magnet Magnetism last night, made it as far as Wallace.
Some really good stuff in there.

[Ya Bezzer!]

Just finished 'Hunger' by Knut Hamsun.  Took me 6 weeks despite being relativity short and myself having loads of time on my hands.  It's easier to discipline yourself when there is a structure to the day.  I will make sure I read more again having finished this.

I'd give it 3 stars out of 5.  The story of a starving (possibly mad) writer trying to get by in 19th century Oslo (then called Kristiania).  The nameless main character didn't elicit much empathy from me.  Much of his suffering was self induced and there are times when he is definitely a bit of a c**t, mocking people, lying and generally showing contempt to people he considers beneath him as an artist, even though he is on the bottom rung of poverty.  Dostoevsky is quoted as an influence but Dostoevsky made even the worst characters human.  Here there is just a sort of central emptiness to it all.  The central character isn't even named and even the other characters have nicknames or invented names that the narrator makes up, The Commander, The Maiden, Ylajali etc.  The over arching emptiness of it kind of reminded of some of Camus' work.  Maybe I'm growing out of proto-existentialism but I feel like I'd like to be less dispassionate as a reader.

[DiegoDiego]

Just finished 'Hunger' by Knut Hamsun.

Thanks for that review. I've been close to buying it a few times but I might give it a miss now.

[Ya Bezzer!]

2 hours ago, DiegoDiego said:

 

Thanks for that review. I've been close to buying it a few times but I might give it a miss now.

I know I said it took me 6 weeks to read it but it's only 200 pages.

It has a score of over 4 on Goodreads so it's not like my opinion is definitive.  

[mathematics]

Just finished Stephen King’s The Stand again, just in case I needed tips for a superflu that kills 99.9% of the population.

[Miguel Sanchez]

The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler

The best of the Philip Marlowes, at least on the current run of me going through them.

[Fullerene]

On 13/04/2020 at 11:34, tongue_tied_danny said:

I've also read Enemy at the Gates by William Craig, another Stalingrad book that is every bit as good as the one by Anthony Beevor.

Made into a film starring Jude Law and Ed Harris but I presume you already know that.

[coprolite]

46 minutes ago, MixuFixit said:

Utopia by Thomas More.

Picked this up in a charity shop years ago and finally got round to reading it. Thomas More, he of getting his head chopped off by Henry VIII fame, recounts a story told to him by a man in Belgium about a far off land called Utopia. He uses this as a vehicle in which to discuss what we'd recognise today as a social democratic model of society & puts into the words of this man relaying the story what I think we can all assume are his own strident criticisms of English society of the time. Having read this I think his head getting chopped off was less to do with Catherine of Aragon and more to do with his ideas in this book. I found it utterly fascinating that someone in the 16th century could see and explain this kind of social model so lucidly. But also I felt utterly crestfallen that nothing's substantially changed in the ensuing 500 years. We're doomed to keep doing the same thing because greed always wins over altruism. Ha ha.

The version i read had a preface which put the book in a different light to how it is usually interpreted. 

The theory was that he was satirising the new, more utilitarian theories about society and religion that were circulating, taking them to their logical extreme and trying to portray a nightmare scenario of idle godlessness. 

I found that a difficult meaning to read into the book, but i think there are certainly dystopian elements in there, but it’s more like "brave new world" than 1984. 

I think it's a very ambiguous book and is in my view certainly not a manifesto for the future. 

[coprolite]

58 minutes ago, MixuFixit said:

Yeah I'd also find that a hard interpretation, there's a whole bit about how intrigued they are by christianity & the last chapter is mainly about their religion. Also their whole thing is using all their free time for self improvement, not much evidence of idleness in it imo. In my one there are a lot of letters sent between More and his contemporaries that I've not read, will need to have a read and see what he was saying to them. The bit about using gold to chain up prisoners because they don't value it as a metal was rather overwrought if you'll pardon the pun.

It's a good 10 years since i read it (after it took my about 6 years of starting and giving up) so I'm quite hazy on the detail. 

I just thought it added to my enjoyment that I had 2 completely opposite ideas about what to expect from it before i started. 

If you do read the letters make sure and post your thoughts on here, would be interested. 

[Florentine_Pogen]

Recently started 'The Histories' by Herodotus.

It's different.