What Are You Reading Now?

[cougjunkie]

Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman By Jon Krakuer.

Just got this for Christmas will start it tonight and let everyone know how it is. Has anyone read it?

[Jeff Lebowski]

I suppose I am one of the last people around to do so, but I am reading Freakonomics. I see what all the fuss is about. Well written and highly entertaining.

[PaloAltoCougar]

I suppose I am one of the last people around to do so, but I am reading Freakonomics. I see what all the fuss is about. Well written and highly entertaining.

I'm with you. My son gave me the book and Superfreakonomics for Christmas. Really fun reads. I loved the comment early on about 7,000,000 American children disappearing when the IRS required SS numbers for dependents on tax returns.

[Mormon Red Death]

I'm with you. My son gave me the book and Superfreakonomics for Christmas. Really fun reads. I loved the comment early on about 7,000,000 American children disappearing when the IRS required SS numbers for dependents on tax returns.

the best part in freakonomics is the names section. The best part in superfreakonomics is the epilogue.

[falafel]

I'm reading Night Fall by Nelson Demille. So far I've enjoyed every one of his books, and I'm not ashamed to admit it.

[happyone]

I'm reading Night Fall by Nelson Demille. So far I've enjoyed every one of his books, and I'm not ashamed to admit it.

You and me both

[Soccermom]

Currently reading "In Cold Blood" by Truman Capote. Just finished "Sunshine" by Robin McKinley.

[falafel]

Currently reading "In Cold Blood" by Truman Capote.

What do you currently think of it? I've wanted to read that book for some time, but I dont' know anyone who has read it.

[Jeff Lebowski]

What do you currently think of it? I've wanted to read that book for some time, but I dont' know anyone who has read it.

It is a classic. Pretty easy read also.

[Surfah]

What do you currently think of it? I've wanted to read that book for some time, but I dont' know anyone who has read it.

I believe this book created the entire genre of crime docs that proliferate most of cable television.

It's like reading an episode of 48 Hours. I served part of my mission in Garden City, KS and as the ZL there covered the city of Holcomb.

[happyone]

What do you currently think of it? I've wanted to read that book for some time, but I dont' know anyone who has read it.

I read it years ago and it was fasinating. It was a fairly easy read also

[Soccermom]

What do you currently think of it? I've wanted to read that book for some time, but I dont' know anyone who has read it.

I only have about 30 pages left to read. Like others have said, it is an easy read. It is provocative, chilling, and disturbing all at once. I am left wanting to know if Capote sticks to the facts and paints everyone in a fair light, or if he was partial at all. The reason I say that is that one of the two murderers I find much more sympathetic than the other, though abhorring what they did. Is that a result of Capote's bias or just a result of the one murderer being more sympathetic?

[MarkGrace]

Finished The Road a couple of weeks ago and just started Blood Meridian. About halfway through The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time as well.

[SeattleUte]

I only have about 30 pages left to read. Like others have said, it is an easy read. It is provocative, chilling, and disturbing all at once. I am left wanting to know if Capote sticks to the facts and paints everyone in a fair light, or if he was partial at all. The reason I say that is that one of the two murderers I find much more sympathetic than the other, though abhorring what they did. Is that a result of Capote's bias or just a result of the one murderer being more sympathetic?

Capote practically fell in love with Perry Smith. He made him the sympathetic complicated anti-hero deliberately. Richard Hickock he made a chiling contrast, and a lot less nuanced. In Cold Blood is technically a novel, a work of fiction. That's because Capote fabricated most of the dialogue, and created some internal monologue, imagery, etc., that he couldn't have discovered. But he made no pretense about what he was doing. He called it a new genre. Mailer did the same thing in The Executioner's Song. The movie about the writnig of In Cold Blood focuses on the terrible toll it took on Capote in that he grew so fond of Perry and needed him to be executed for his creation to become a great work of art. There's a New Yorker article that tells the same story about Capote/Perry; the movie was factual. I think there is a lot of truth in Capote's characterizations of Smith and Hickock from what I've read.

I think In Cold Blood is a great and groundbreaking novel.

[happyone]

I finished To Try Men's Souls by Gingrich and Forstchen over the weekend. It is a straight historical fiction novel, unlike their previous historical novels that are "alternate history", about the battle of Trenton in 1776. It follows the battle and the events leading up to it through eyes of 3 main characters, Washington, Thomas Paine and one that I am pretty sure is fictional - a common soldier who happens to be from Trenton.

One of the secondary characters is the Hessian Commander Col Rahl (SP). The authors use him to disparage the British officer corps in general and the whole way officers were selected and promoted in the British Army.

It presents the battle as a last ditch effort by Washington to get some kind of victory before his army disappears and the revolution is lost. He is portrayed as pretty desperate at this time.

From what I've read of the Revolutionary war, the history is pretty accurate.

IMO, if you enjoy historical fiction, this is worth a read.