What are you currently reading?

"Wake Up" is the first

"Wake Up" is the first Keruoac book I've read, so I don't really know, but I've heard, like Angie mentioned, that Dharma Bums is great. On the Road is also supposed to be good, and was I think his first novel. I'm going to read it next, followed by bums.
 
Bill Bryson's books are

Bill Bryson's books are brilliant. I reread his "Brief History..." about once a year and just finished "Walk in the Woods" again.

I love David Brin's stories and have read most everything he's put out. BTW, if you like his stuff, try Ian M. Banks. A bit dryer and more convoluted, but wonderfully creative and worth the effort.

I'm reading Evening in the Palace of Reason, by James R. Gaines, sort of a simultaneous biography of J. S. Bach and Frederick the Great at the birth of the Enlightenment.

I'm listening to Boone: A Biography, by Robert Morgan. It's a biography of Daniel Boone. (Who was much cooler than I was ever lead to believe.)

It's a wonderful thing to have a librarian for a spouse.
 
Finished "Mandala" by Pearl

Finished "Mandala" by Pearl S. Buck this morning.

Also reading "The House of the Seven Gables" by Nathaniel Hawthorne and "Love Monkey" by Kyle Smith. I like to keep a balance of classic/cerebral and fun fiction, although Kyle Smith's writing is smart and chewy- not mindless at all.
 
Namaste wrote:"Wake Up" is

Namaste said:
"Wake Up" is the first Keruoac book I've read, so I don't really know, but I've heard, like Angie mentioned, that Dharma Bums is great. On the Road is also supposed to be good, and was I think his first novel. I'm going to read it next, followed by bums.

I'm gonna have to recommend On the Road before bums. Both are great though, so it really doesn't matter.
 
I tried reading Moby Dick the

I tried reading Moby Dick the other day. Didn't get very far :(

The Resilient Garden looks great Art. I'm gonna pick it up from the library this weekend.
 
Moby Dick is the most easily

Moby Dick is the most easily found Easton Press leather-bound book ever because it's so impossible to read and everyone gets rid of it first! I have a rule to not struggle through anything I don't enjoy- life is too short and there are too many great books to read!
 
twinkletoes wrote:Moby Dick

twinkletoes said:
Moby Dick is the most easily found Easton Press leather-bound book ever because it's so impossible to read and everyone gets rid of it first! I have a rule to not struggle through anything I don't enjoy- life is too short and there are too many great books to read!

Yeah it is a catch 22. There are a ton of books I have struggled through and then been richly rewarded. But Moby Dick and Ulysses are two that I just couldn't do it. And I gave each a fair shake.

War and Peace, I'm still deciding if I liked it or not... a year later :)
 
As a fellow nerd, i have to

As a fellow nerd, i have to say "+infinifty" on Salvatore and Tolkien. I'm not familiar with Martin, though. I also read a lot of Tom Clancy and James Patterson. I will also confess to reading, and really liking, the Harry Potter and Twilight series. I appreciate a good story, and both of those are excellent stories.

Reading for me is a guilty pleasure. I would rather read than watch a movie, but unfortunately haven't had much time lately for either one. When I do have a chance to read, I don't "waste" my limited leisure time on something that's going to "enrich my soul" or "make me a more worldly person." I just wanna be entertained.
 
 Currently Have Born To Run,

Currently Have Born To Run, Lost Symbol, and The Law of Nines all sitting on my night stand to be read. (I got Barnes and Noble gift cards for Christmas :) )



Series/books I have LOVED would be Harry Potter, anything by Phillipa Gregory, The Sword of Truth Series, Pride and Prejudice, all the Tolkein books, and the Chronicles of Narnia.



I'm hoping to blast through the books I have right now pretty quick, class starts back up next week and I generally find it impossible to balance reading for pleasure with reading for class...
 
Hi Joseph,Interesting

Hi Joseph,

Interesting statistic that Bill Bryson mentions is that the average American walks (walks not runs by the way) only 1 mile per week.

Wow how is that possible!!!! does everyone sit cross legged in a meditation position all day.

I probably walk a mile an hour when I'm at work and I have a sit down computer job.

I ran 14.5km yesterday, 4km in the hills the day before and a 7km the day before. Today is my relax day but I'm just about to do something else like go to the gym.



Neil
 
I found Moby Dick to be way

I found Moby Dick to be way easier than Ulysses (for which I needed a guide to a couple of chapters, as I think pretty much anyone would). I would rate Moby Dick as one of the greatest english-language books ever written.

I'm struggling with my current read though, Thomas Pynchon's Against The Day. I find it easier going than Gravity's Rainbow, which I have started twice and never finished, though more difficult than Mason & Dixon, which I thoroughly enjoyed. The problem is that it demands regular and 'immersive' reading, something which I don't seem to be able to do these days (Mason & Dixon was read while I lived in Spain and had to contend with the awful quality of TV over there).
 
Neil, Bryson accounts for it

Neil, Bryson accounts for it (avg. of 385 yards a day walking!) by pointing out that most people will happily get into their cars to drive to the foot of their driveways to retreive a newspaper or waiting 15 minutes to get a really good parking spot rather than parking a bit farther out in the lot.

Oye! He might be exagerating, but not in spirit.
 
tavis69 wrote:I found Moby

tavis69 said:
I found Moby Dick to be way easier than Ulysses (for which I needed a guide to a couple of chapters, as I think pretty much anyone would). I would rate Moby Dick as one of the greatest english-language books ever written

Really? I guess I could see someone enjoying Melville from that angle, or even the history aspect.

I'll take Heart of Darkness over Moby Dick any day.
 
 Abide, at some point

Abide, at some point consider trying Moby Dick again. Here's a small encouragement: that book is like a train rolling down a long long long hill. It starts at an incredibly glacial pace. And the pace only increases a little bit with each chapter. But by the last chapter it is storming unstoppably.

Unfortunately it's gotten this terribly fearsome reputation, perhaps because of its horridly slow beginning. It's really playful once you get into it, much like Pynchon or (more accessible) Neil Stephenson. Actually I would recommend practically any Neil Stephenson book as a playful and supersmart epic, but Cryptonomicon is the classic.

Tavis69, I struggle with Pynchon too. He's so f*cking talented. And yet mostly unpenetrable and trite. If you haven't read the Crying of Lot 49, drop Against the Day immediately. I think Lot 49 is where it all works for me.

cheers
 
+1 on Neil Stephenson.

+1 on Neil Stephenson. Diamond Age is one of my all-time favorites, though Cryptonomicon is usually recommended as the place to start (and I agree). Snow Crash is also classic, especially for presaging Second Life so well.
 
Am in the middle of a book I

Am in the middle of a book I picked up in New Zealand called Once Were Warriors about the Maori experience in contemporary culture and its really depressing so I switched out to Last Words, the George Carlin bio. Much less depressing, but it does make me miss George. To the Youtubes!

Read Moby Dick. Hard to read, but its more like really earning the story and the payoff at the end.