Other Books You're Reading

[elise]

Currently rereading "the Return of the King" (tolkien). Just a little light reading before i return to school.
plus i just finished watching the extended version on DVD and wanted to see how they compare to the original. Gotta tell you, there's nothing like the written word for detail and description. Movies just don't cut it and they leave out so much of the finer details.

Planning to read the Brother Karamazov before school goes back as well.

[elise]

Stapler always beats tazer gun. It's like rock beating scissors.

[Lise]

I just read Bob Dylan's chronicles book and it was fantastic.  Its told in that rambly story kind of way, with his perceptions of things.  I loved it because it is just the way I want to read biography not comprehensive but a bunch of scattered but specific memories and impressions.  I always liked his songs and wondered where such a crazy way with words could come from.  His book felt like you almost got to look where he looked from sometimes for half a second.

[Lise]

This is totally off topic but here is a link to a reading by bob dylan on woody guthrie thats amazing; I just found it and thought i would share
http://www.bobdylan.com/audio/albumtracks/RealAudio/guthrie_bootleg.ram

[Seed]

This is a great thread that may change my books on deck.

I saw that Axon is reading, "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time".  What a strange book.  I pulled that book off the shelf at the local Borders and could not put it down.  I was forced to buy the book and read the rest of the book the same weekend.
 
Books I am currently reading:
Demons by FD
Abba's Child by Brennon Manning
Confessions by Augustine

Books on deck:
The Adolescent
Notes from Underground
Heart of Darkness

[Mogwai]

Brendan Manning is indeed a great author and human being...great speaker, too.

[Seed]

He has had an impact on my life and this is my second time reading Abba's Child.  I have never heard him speak, but will someday.

He also quotes TBK in Abba's Child  .

[axon]

"The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time".  What a strange book.

Yeah, but overall the book isn't very good - you could read my review of it on my website.

[Seed]

I agree, but I suppose it depends on with what you have compare it.  Compared to most of the pop non-fiction garbage on the shelves at the local book store, it's not bad.  Compared to classics that have stood the test of time.... yep, it's garbage.

I kept a running list of books I read last year and rated them from 1 to 10 (each relative to all the books read last year).  I do not remember what the rating of that book was, but I will post the spreadsheet once I sync my pocketpc to this computer.

I will read your review once I learn the location of your webpage.

[Seed]

I will read your review once I learn the location of your webpage.

Okay, I learned.  I also read your review with the strange feeling that you were going to flame the book.  I agree with your review in full.  I may not have been so hard on the last 2/3rds of the book as you were, but the first 60 pagers were definitely better than the latter pages.

[Dillon]

Currently reading:
Notes From Underground--Dostoevsky
Of Mice And Men--Steinbeck--This was assigned, and I am to read the entirety of it by Monday at 10:00 AM for a test in Honors English. I am currently halfway into it, and have found little redeeming philophical quality to it, though it is somewhat entertaining.

Reading next:
Crime And Punishment--Dostoevsky
The Catcher In The Rye--Salinger--This is also assigned in Honors English, and is heralded by my teacher as a student favorite. This is not a very honorable status, though...
Fahrenheit 451--Bradbury--After a long period of being almost urged to read this, I suppose I will.

[axon]

Dillon, those are all great books. Please refer to my reply in the "members updates" thread?

I know that "Catcher in the Rye" was one of my favorites in high school - and I've reread it several times since then.

I also found out that if I had a negative outlook on a book I haven't read yet, I often would not be motivated to read it and in the long run would not like it. After picking the book sometime later because I heard good things about it, it turned out to be quite good.

Give each book a chance man.  

[Dillon]

Of Mice And Men--Steinbeck

I finished this yesterday, as was prescribed, and I now have to write a character analysis on it. Steinbeck is very visual writer, I found--the way he describes surroundings and the words and ideas (or lack thereof at times) he gives his characters are very easily perceivable, and so there is a very fluid image in your mind as you read.

Give each book a chance man.

Thanks for your post--I realize I should be more open-minded.

[axon]

I'm in the middle of these books:

"Stories of God" - Rilke
Rilke's prose from his young years.

"Devil's Apocrypha" - de Vito
I thought this would be better...but I'm still struggling through it. Basically, it is a story of the "real truth" - the Devil's side of the bible.

also reading Bloom's "Where shall wisdom be found"

[kudzai]

Letters On Cezanne by Rilke.

"One has to be able at every moment to place one's hand on the earth like the first human being."

Rilke letters from Paris to his wife in Bremen in 1907 chronicles Rilke's reaction to an exhibition of Cezanne's paintings in Paris.

This modest looking book not only poetically explains the changing aesthetics brought about by the challenges of the Avant Garde; but it also gives us a glimpse of Rilke's artistic development from poems like The Panther to his later masterpieces of The Duino Elegies and The Sonnets of Opheus.

Dillon, great posts I like your perspective on things, but if I were you, I wouldn't bother with Salinger's Catcher in the Rye- It's become an embarrassing cliche and should be confined to the dustbin of its time. I have this personal theory that Salinger became a recluse because he was so  embarrassed about writing it.