What Are You Reading Now?

[SteelBlue]

Just finished Educated. Really well written and it resonated with me

Educated was a trip. I still don't know if I believe half of it.

[SteelBlue]

The Longlist for the Hilary Mantel award, er, I mean the Man Booker award was released today.

The full longlist is:

•Diane Cook, “The New Wilderness”


•Tsitsi Dangarembga, “This Mournable Body”


•Avni Doshi, “Burnt Sugar”


•Gabriel Krauze, “Who They Was”


•Hilary Mantel, “The Mirror and the Light”


•Colum McCann, “Apeirogon”


•Maaza Mengiste, “The Shadow King”


•Kiley Reid, “Such a Fun Age”


•Brandon Taylor, “Real Life”


•Anne Tyler, “Redhead by the Side of the Road”


•Douglas Stuart, “Shuggie Bain”


•Sophie Ward, “Love and Other Thought Experiments”


•C Pam Zhang, “How Much of These Hills Is Gold”

[BigPiney]

The Longlist for the Hilary Mantel award, er, I mean the Man Booker award was released today.

Yeah it is hers. Kind of a foregone conclusion like last year. I still think Testaments was not that good.

Difference is Mantel's is really good.

[SeattleUte]

Last week I finished a 2,000 page trek through Tolstoy. Re-reading War and Peace and Anna Karenina in my Twitter book clubs. My impressions are the same as last time. War and Peace probably my favorite novel of all time (okay, last time I’d have said certainly). I like Madame Bovary better than Anna Karenina (I remember those debates with Levin; I still think that Oblonsky is a better man than Levin). I compare these novels two as they are the two greatest adultery novels, and Flaubert’s masterpiece influenced Tolstoy. After War and Peace, I think some of Tolstoy’s short works are his greatest. He remains probably my favorite novelist.

Tonight I finished The Maytrees by Annie Dillard, also in a twitter book club. It’s like a book-length poem. Very literary. A fractured marriage on Cape Cod.

Meanwhile, I finally read Eichmann in Jerusalem. Wow. You learn something every day. Here is a whole new perspective on the Holocaust. Hannah Arendt is pitiless. She pities no one.

I laid down 2666 for a spell, and have picked it up again. It’s one of those 1,000-page novels that you don’t love, that makes you wonder if all the hype is just hype, but you complulsively keep reading. A very weird book. A few years ago I found myself actually finishing very big novels I didn’t love.

I’m looking for another non-fiction and am considering Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste, which the Times’s Dwight Garner (a superb reviewer) called an “instant classic.”

I’ve finally gained a foothold in Mantel’s The Mirror and the Light after a couple of false starts.

Vernon Subutex 2 is out, but I’m due to start Proust (all of In Search of Lost Time) in one of the twitter book clubs, in a week. Also, a book of poetry for my other twitter book club. So VS2 will have to wait a while.

[SteelBlue]

...but I’m due to start Proust (all of In Search of Lost Time) in one of the twitter book clubs, in a week.

I'm wrapping up Book V The Captive and The Fugitive this week and then have the final book to finish. I started 4 years ago and I read them on the side, so they've never been my main focus. I've enjoyed being in Marcel's head over the years though and it's been among my favorite reading experiences. I usually directly engage and plow through any novel I like. This is the only one I've taken this kind of time with. When I finally made it to Paris, I looked him up at Pere Lachaise and thanked him for the experience.

[BigPiney]

Last week I finished a 2,000 page trek through Tolstoy. Re-reading War and Peace and Anna Karenina in my Twitter book clubs. My impressions are the same as last time. War and Peace probably my favorite novel of all time (okay, last time I’d have said certainly). I like Madame Bovary better than Anna Karenina (I remember those debates with Levin; I still think that Oblonsky is a better man than Levin). I compare these novels two as they are the two greatest adultery novels, and Flaubert’s masterpiece influenced Tolstoy. After War and Peace, I think some of Tolstoy’s short works are his greatest. He remains probably my favorite novelist.

Tonight I finished The Maytrees by Annie Dillard, also in a twitter book club. It’s like a book-length poem. Very literary. A fractured marriage on Cape Cod.

Meanwhile, I finally read Eichmann in Jerusalem. Wow. You learn something every day. Here is a whole new perspective on the Holocaust. Hannah Arendt is pitiless. She pities no one.

I laid down 2666 for a spell, and have picked it up again. It’s one of those 1,000-page novels that you don’t love, that makes you wonder if all the hype is just hype, but you complulsively keep reading. A very weird book. A few years ago I found myself actually finishing very big novels I didn’t love.

I’m looking for another non-fiction and am considering Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste, which the Times’s Dwight Garner (a superb reviewer) called an “instant classic.”

I’ve finally gained a foothold in Mantel’s The Mirror and the Light after a couple of false starts.

Vernon Subutex 2 is out, but I’m due to start Proust (all of In Search of Lost Time) in one of the twitter book clubs, in a week. Also, a book of poetry for my other twitter book club. So VS2 will have to wait a while.

Got Vernon #2 from the library today. Was a nice surprise to see that show up in the inbox

[SeattleUte]

Got Vernon #2 from the library today. Was a nice surprise to see that show up in the inbox

Don’t give away any spoilers.

I forgot to mention I read The Turn of the Screw, also in the A Public Space book club. I’d never been able to hack Henry James, all those clunky super formal sentences. But The Turn of the Screw is the place to break in. It’s a novella, and eventually you get used to his writing stye.

[SteelBlue]

Got Vernon #2 from the library today. Was a nice surprise to see that show up in the inbox

Don’t give away any spoilers.

I forgot to mention I read The Turn of the Screw, also in the A Public Space book club. I’d never been able to hack Henry James, all those clunky super formal sentences. But The Turn of the Screw is the place to break in. It’s a novella, and eventually you get used to his writing style.

Do you guys read them in French?

SU, have you read any Sheridan LeFanu? I found him after reading Turn of the Screw and looking for more examples of gothic horror. There's a collection of his stories called In a Glass Darkly that I enjoyed and I'm guessing you would too.

[BigPiney]

Do you guys read them in French?

SU, have you read any Sheridan LeFanu? I found him after reading Turn of the Screw and looking for more examples of gothic horror. There's a collection of his stories called In a Glass Darkly that I enjoyed and I'm guessing you would too.

English translation. Though I was tempted.

[Donuthole]

Just finished Boys In the Boat. Enjoyed it, though it was a bit lighter on WWII-Nazi history than I expected it to be. Still, an amazing story. Joe Rantz's childhood was so effed up. Nearly unbelievable what he overcame and how he survived (and eventually thrived).

[Jeff Lebowski]

Just finished Boys In the Boat. Enjoyed it, though it was a bit lighter on WWII-Nazi history than I expected it to be. Still, an amazing story. Joe Rantz's childhood was so effed up. Nearly unbelievable what he overcame and how he survived (and eventually thrived).

Loved that book.

Now go watch the American Experience episode about it. It is great.

[Donuthole]

Loved that book.

Now go watch the American Experience episode about it. It is great.

I'll do that. I watched Reifenstahl's "Olympia" last night after finishing the book. Had seen bits and pieces before, but I watched (almost) the entire thing. Then had to go searching for Reifenstahl's footage of the gold medal race, as that wasn't in "Olympia" (I'm guessing because the US won and it pissed Hitler off).

[SeattleUte]

Do you guys read them in French?

SU, have you read any Sheridan LeFanu? I found him after reading Turn of the Screw and looking for more examples of gothic horror. There's a collection of his stories called In a Glass Darkly that I enjoyed and I'm guessing you would too.

No. English. But the translation is terrific. I love Subutex. It's been compared to Michel Houellebecq, who I enjoy, but I think Subutex is better fiction (Houellebecq is entertaining more as essay-like social commentary.)

I'll check out the Gothic horror stuff in due course. But I see The Turn of the Screw more about psychological breakdown. I realize there are differing interpretations.

[SteelBlue]

I'll check out the Gothic horror stuff in due course. But I see The Turn of the Screw more about psychological breakdown. I realize there are differing interpretations.

I see Le Fanu's collection in much the same way. His ability to describe and express anxiety left me certain he had personal experience with it, either his own or someone close to him.

[happyone]

Just finished Boys In the Boat. Enjoyed it, though it was a bit lighter on WWII-Nazi history than I expected it to be. Still, an amazing story. Joe Rantz's childhood was so effed up. Nearly unbelievable what he overcame and how he survived (and eventually thrived).

I really need to move this one up on the To Read list

I recently finished The Return of George Washington
This a look a what Washington did between his resigning as CinC of the Army in 1783 and becoming President in 1789. Much of the narrative is his indirect influence on the nature of and the getting it the constitution ratified by the states. One tidbit I learned is that Rhode Island never sent a delegation to the Constitutional Convention. The author also looks at his proported withdrawal from public life, returning to Mt. Vernon, going on a tour of his properties west of the Alleghenies, which he was trying to make profitable, his involvement in the attempts to make the Potomac navigable it's entire length - thus making his properties in Kentucky profitable. On his withdrawal from public life, he was very active behind the scenes on redoing the Articles of Confederation, and making a Gov't that was truly National. 4 stars on GR - Very good read

I'm currently reading a Medieval Mystery set in Tudor times - specifically the reign of Edward VI - 1549. #7 in the Matthew Shardlake Mystery series by C.J Sansom, Tombland

In this one the Main Character - A hunchback lawyer named Matthew Shardlake, travels to Norwich to make sure one of Lady Elizabeth (the future Queen) distant relatives gets a fair trial, have been accused of murdering his wife. While there, he gets got up ina peasant revolt. In the past, in this series, the history is solid and the mysteries interesting. In this one the author is looking a the way Medieval Society was structured, very class oriented and not much movement between classes, how the poor were treated and the effects of the closure of common lands affect the small farmers. The reletive and the murder mystery are fictional, the peasant revolt/rebellion isn't. I'm about half way through and am enjoying it very much - definitely shaping up to be a 4+ star read on GR