blackshoe Posted August 25, 2010 Report Share Posted August 25, 2010 I am currently re-reading The Deed of Paksennarion by Elizabeth Moon. It's about a sheep farmer's daughter who runs away from home to become a soldier, and ends up a Paladin. Pretty good fantasy — Moon was a Marine, and knows what's she's writing about in describing Paks' training and the battles she goes through. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jjbrr Posted August 25, 2010 Report Share Posted August 25, 2010 I'm starting a Rich Dad trilogy. Really learning a lot (of common sense?) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Posted August 25, 2010 Report Share Posted August 25, 2010 I'm starting a Rich Dad trilogy. Really learning a lot (of common sense?) Tony Robbins and Zig Ziegler can't be far behind... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luke warm Posted August 25, 2010 Report Share Posted August 25, 2010 "Debunking 9/11 Myths" by Popular Mechanics. Now I can go back and read the water cooler threads and understand what thermite is. cue winston in 3.... 2.... 1... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoAnneM Posted August 25, 2010 Report Share Posted August 25, 2010 I think there should be a law against an author selling his name - like James Patterson. He even admits he only reviews the first drafts, doesn't help write them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elianna Posted August 26, 2010 Report Share Posted August 26, 2010 I recently finished the Girl series. There were several times I was tempted to throw the second book at the wall, and only refrained so that Adam didn't have to repaint. The math stuff in it REALLY annoyed me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenberg Posted August 26, 2010 Report Share Posted August 26, 2010 I recently finished the Girl series. There were several times I was tempted to throw the second book at the wall, and only refrained so that Adam didn't have to repaint. The math stuff in it REALLY annoyed me. I found the math stuff charmingly ludicrous. There is this part where her girlfriend, I forget the name right now, talks of how smart the heroine is. Something like "She is up to algebra, doing all sorts of stuff I can't understand". And then she gets shot just as she has found her own proof of Fermat's Last Theorem, but then can't recall it because of the injury to her brain. I enjoyed all three, but I thought it too bad that the author died shortly after delivering the manuscripts. The publishers probably figured it would be bad karma or something to do any editing after his death. It could seriously have used some. But I just liked the heroine a lot. Some of the far fetched stuff, well, I have seen worse. PS I do realize that there are other reasons to regret someone's death beyond the fact that it may have short-circuited the editing process. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenberg Posted August 28, 2010 Report Share Posted August 28, 2010 My wife, who reads about five books while I read one, is big on The Outlander by Gil Adamson. (This is not Outlander that the movie was made from.) Adamson is a Canadian author, the story is set in Western Canada and, I think, crossing over some into Montana in 1903. I don't usually piggy-back on Becky's choices but she has mentioned several times how much she likes this one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
USViking Posted August 30, 2010 Report Share Posted August 30, 2010 The PC has taken my reading down >90% in recent years. I go months without reading anything other than what is on the monitor now in front of me. That is not good, and really does need to change, because the good old-fashion book has been a giant carrying human beings on shoulder now for Millennia, and I wish and I hope that goes onforever and ever, world without end, Amen. I did just recently finish a real, honest non-paperback, actual book. The book was a biography of Paul Dirac, whose personal theology, I learned, entailed that Mother Nature (my term, not Dirac's) would ensure that human beings, as a species, possess everlasting life(my theology as well as Dirac's). I already knew Dirac held out no hope for individual immortalityas envisioned by the Judeo-Christian-Islamic mainstream. Dirac was such an extreme and outspoken atheist that he incitedanother great scientist (Wolfgang Pauli, who did believe in God) to joke: There is no God, and Dirac is His Prophet Dirac may have had the most mathematical ability of any scientist of the last 100 years (even Feynman said: "I am no Dirac") and that is saying a hell of a lot. Dirac's approach was to search for and follow mathematical beauty,under the assumption that therein lay Truth. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gerardo Posted August 30, 2010 Report Share Posted August 30, 2010 I found the math stuff charmingly ludicrous. There is this part where her girlfriend, I forget the name right now, talks of how smart the heroine is. Something like "She is up to algebra, doing all sorts of stuff I can't understand". And then she gets shot just as she has found her own proof of Fermat's Last Theorem, but then can't recall it because of the injury to her brain. Looks like an homage to the original "I have a marvelous proof of this, but the margin is too small" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elianna Posted August 30, 2010 Report Share Posted August 30, 2010 Besides the math stuff being annoying, what bothered me was that in the first book, they SHOWED us that the Girl was very smart. She solved problems, she connected dots, etc. The second book TOLD us that the Girl was very smart by TELLING us that she solved a problem (but never showing us that solution, because, well, duh) and having lots of characters tell us that she was smart. But I didn't feel that we were SHOWN that. I mean, I wouldn't have needed to be shown that, because it was from the first book, but the constant telling about how smart she was left me wondering if the author thought that we forgot the first book, or just needed to be hit over the head with that again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
y66 Posted November 13, 2010 Author Report Share Posted November 13, 2010 Life by Keith Richards. The first person scoop on the legendary career stuff is fascinating, as expected. The real life stuff, and the passion and directness with which Richards tells every story in this book, was something of a surprise for me, including stories like the one he tells about his grandfather Gus who helped nurture his love of music and eventually introduced him to the guitar. The guy can riff in prose too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hanoi5 Posted November 14, 2010 Report Share Posted November 14, 2010 Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card. Nice SF novel I'd say. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gwnn Posted February 13, 2011 Report Share Posted February 13, 2011 I just started The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. And I just learned that it's a movie! I'm so out of it!I started it now and I think it's very good writing. no spoilers please! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenberg Posted February 13, 2011 Report Share Posted February 13, 2011 I just finished The Postmistress. I recommend it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gwnn Posted February 17, 2011 Report Share Posted February 17, 2011 wow the girl with the dragon tattoo was a lot of fun! i hope hte other two are at least half as good! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
the_dude Posted February 24, 2011 Report Share Posted February 24, 2011 Just picked up Endgame (Bobby Fischer bio) and it's pretty good so far. Interesting parallels between the Bridge world and Chess world. Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card. Nice SF novel I'd say. I'm not a sci-fi fan .. but a friend insisted I read Ender's Game a while back and I must admit it was fantastic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mike777 Posted February 24, 2011 Report Share Posted February 24, 2011 Just picked up Endgame (Bobby Fischer bio) and it's pretty good so far. Interesting parallels between the Bridge world and Chess world. I'm not a sci-fi fan .. but a friend insisted I read Ender's Game a while back and I must admit it was fantastic. Ya Endgame was a pretty good book by an author who really knew Bobby. btw reading Card's new sci fi book http://www.avclub.com/articles/orson-scott-card-the-lost-gate,51258/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gwnn Posted February 25, 2011 Report Share Posted February 25, 2011 The math stuff in it REALLY annoyed me.Technically speaking, she only solved Fermat's theorem for n=3, at least that's what the book appears to say. I don't know how it's proven but I think it has been done in the 17th century, so she could have figured it out. What annoyed me was how she figured out the Rubik cube in 40 minutes and how she survived the headshot and live burial. edit: proven in 1770 by Euler via infinite descent. I don't think such a mundane solution would have amused such a hyper-intelligent girl. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenberg Posted February 25, 2011 Report Share Posted February 25, 2011 As is usually the case, the math stuff is best ignored. I remember I was watching a movie once where the main characters were playing a hand of bridge. My dog could bid better, and she's been dead for two years. In general I think the book needed some serious editing but I liked it anyway. We are going to the movie tonight. Added: We saw the movie and I highly recommend it. They had to strip down a bit (they deep-sixed Fermat) but the essential parts are well handled. The second and third in the trio will be in town in about four weeks and I am looking forward to them. Added to added: Yes, the second and third parts of the movie are also very good. The books had more layers, as books usually do, but the movies were fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gwnn Posted August 15, 2011 Report Share Posted August 15, 2011 Thoroughly disappointed by The Grand Design by Hawking & Mlodinow. The most interesting part of the book is the final chapter that is only 10 pages long, with a confused explanation that starts with the Game of Life but then shifts to why/how the universe could appear out of nothing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blackshoe Posted August 16, 2011 Report Share Posted August 16, 2011 Just finished: Ghost Story, by Jim Butcher. Latest in the Dresden Files. Harry Dresden is Chicago's only consulting wizard. Lately, though, he's got a big problem — he's dead. In progress: Economics in One Lesson, by Henry Hazlitt. The lesson is a single sentence. Chapters one and 24 discuss the lesson itself. The other 22 chapters are examples of how the lesson was ignored. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shyams Posted August 16, 2011 Report Share Posted August 16, 2011 Read and re-read a sci-fi book: BlindSight by Peter Watts. The book is available free to download at http://www.rifters.com/real/blindsight.htm although I realised that only after buying and reading the printed version. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenberg Posted August 16, 2011 Report Share Posted August 16, 2011 Sooner or later I get to most all of the Daniel Silva novels. I just finished his next to latest book, The Rembrandt Affair. In any series that features the ongoing adventures of a single main character, there is a problem in keeping it all fresh. Silva manages this better than most. Probably this book works reasonably well as a stand-alone volume. It helps to know that Gabriel Allon is a now aging Israeli spy/assassin who, before recruitment, was (and still is) a talented restorer of paintings. His first wife, and his child, were the victims of a car bomb intended for him. She is still alive, but destroyed mentally. His second wife, Chiara, is also an agent. The rest will fall into place if you read it. These international thriller things are always a matter of personal taste. Some other things from this genre that I have liked are "The Day of the Jackal", "Gorky Park" and 'Marathon Man". Of these, The Day of the Jackal was made into a good movie (1973, not the absurd 1997 revision). The other two lost a lot in translation to the screen. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hanoi5 Posted August 17, 2011 Report Share Posted August 17, 2011 I was given a lot of best-sellers books by these LOL's at the club and read 'The Charm School'. It was an interesting concept about spionage and the Cold War. I finished Slaughterhouse V on the weekend. Interesting piece, looking forward to read more from Vonnegut. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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