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-   -   Whatcha reading? (http://cellar.org/showthread.php?t=2940)

Jakeline 03-04-2003 10:12 AM

Whatcha reading?
 
So, have you read anything interesting lately? Here's what I've recently read:


Darwin's Radio by Greg Bear - Hard sci-fi. It spent a lot of time developing the charactors, but that isn't what's really good about this book. The story is very thought-provoking and written in a style that makes it feel a bit too real. As the title implies, it's about evolution, but it's set in modern times. Good stuff.

American Gods by Neil Gaiman - Modern mythology. I'm not so good with mythology (I can never get all the names straight), but it didn't really diminish my appreciation for this book. It is a bit violent and explicit, but no more than say, an old Stephen King book. The story is compelling, but a bit disjointed. A basic knowledge of mythology would have probably deepened my appreciation for this book.


So, what are you reading, and is it any good?

perth 03-04-2003 10:42 AM

book 5 of the wheel of time (the fires of heaven, robert jordan) - i dig this series. its fantasy, but you really get the sense that its a bigger world, well thought-out and compelling.

neverwhere (neil gaiman) - recommended in a previous thread by jeni i think. good stuff.

the castle of otranto (horace walpole) - considered the first gothic novel, its got atmosphere. not especially scary, but defininitely an interesting read.

~james

juju 03-04-2003 11:26 AM

<i>Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies</i>, by Jared Diamond.

This book asks the question, "Why did civilization develop at such different rates on the different continents?" For example, why didn't the Africans or the Native Americans grow in power and then conquer the Europeans? On the surface, the answer seems to be because the Europeans developed certain technologies first. Thus, they were more powerful, and were able to conquer peoples. But why were they able to do this before anyone else? The author proposes that it was not just random chance, but the evironment they lived in. It was the domesticatability of the plants and animals in the area they lived in (and the areas to the east and west of them) that enabled them to change from hunter-gatherer societies to agricultural societies. The better food production then enabled some people to do nothing but research a certain topic.

It's a history book, and it won the pulitzer prize. It's written from a biological evolutional perspective, though, and I really like the scientific approach the author uses to try to take on these historical questions. The way that the different fields that the author has studied merge into one grand theory is really interesting.

I just got this book, so I have yet to get very far into it. But I can't wait to see what the author's ideas are.

Cam 03-04-2003 01:12 PM

Essential Biology

Hehe, it's actually been the most interesting thing I've read in a long time. Well besides the few times I've gotten to read a bit of Everythings Eventual by Stephen King.

elSicomoro 03-04-2003 09:08 PM

I don't read books...hurts my head too much.

Dagney 03-04-2003 09:45 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by sycamore
I don't read books...hurts my head too much.
Well, it may be a bit easier on you if you dont hit them against your forehead :D

*duckin*

Dagney

elSicomoro 03-04-2003 09:56 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Dagney
Well, it may be a bit easier on you if you dont hit them against your forehead
Well, you see, the problem is...I try to read one. Then I get frustrated. This starts the head-hurting. Then, in frustration, I hit them against my forehead. That makes my head hurt even more. :)

SteveDallas 03-04-2003 10:01 PM

1 Attachment(s)
Hee hee... did you used to do marketing for the Book of the Month Club, sycamore?

I'm reading the first volume of Ian Kershaw's biography of Hitler. I believe it's called "Hubris: 1889-1936", but I'm too lazy to look up the exact title. Anyway, it is fascinating. I highly recommend it if you're interested in Hitler or the 3rd Reich. (Though it is long, and somewhat dry in places. And man, all those German political parties get to be a confusing alphabet soup.)

juju 03-04-2003 10:03 PM

And yet, you read all of our nonsense all day?

elSicomoro 03-04-2003 10:16 PM

Holy shit Steve! That's where I stole my post from...I used to send back the "no" sticker all the time on those.

In one of the teen magazines we used to get in high school (not Tiger Beat or shit like that, but ones that were produced by a company like Scholastic), there was this one ad...I believe it was something about staying in school or something. And it said something like, "If you don't want to go to school anymore, cut this out and paste it on your forehead." The cutout read:

<center>I'M AN IDIOT
AND I DON'T GIVE A DAMN
ABOUT MY FUTURE</center>

I saw that during freshman year...and it became my mantra all through high school.

The scary part about the Cellar, Pimp Daddy Juju, is that sometimes you can learn more about the ways of the world here than you can from a book.

wolf 03-05-2003 12:26 AM

The Hitler Bio sounds interesting. I'll have to check it out. I read Toland's massive version back when I was in high school.

Right now I'm reading Executive Decision by Tom Clancy, although wading through it is probably a more accurate description ... it's not that I'm not liking it ... I AM.

It's just damn long ... the paperback is over 1300 pages! :eek:

And is essentially a continuation of the previous Ryan novel, Debt of Honor.

It's fantastic, though, edge of my seat reading. IMNSHO, it took Clancy a while to get ahold of the idea of evoking an emotional response in his readers, but man, he's got it down good for this one.

I'm going to have to read something light and fluffy afterwards before I start searching around to see where the hell I put the copy of the next Clancy. I KNOW I bought it. It just ended up underneath something else probably.

SteveDallas 03-05-2003 07:18 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by wolf
The Hitler Bio sounds interesting. I'll have to check it out. I read Toland's massive version back when I was in high school.
Even if you don't intend to read the whole thing, you may check out the introductory mini-chapter. He talks a little bit about "why ANOTHER Hitler biography?"

smoothmoniker 03-05-2003 01:53 PM

Every few year, I reread my list of essential books. I'm in the middle of that right now. They include

The Brothers Karamazov
THE trilogy (tolkein)
Critique of Pure Reason by Kant
Christ the Center by Deitrich Bonhoeffer
Beneath the Underdog by Charlie Mingus
So Long and Thanks for all the fish (and all associated nonsense)

In the middle of the Kant right now. A nice glass of Walker Black label, a hot bath, three or four paragraphs before my brain explodes behind my eyes into a thousand contradictory pieces. I hate Kant.

-sm

jaguar 03-05-2003 03:46 PM

Salman Rushdie - Satanic Verses
Tom Wolf - The bonfire of vanities
Willian Giibson - Party Time
Andrew Hunt, David Thomas - Pragamatic Programming

Just finished Niel Stepherson - Diamond Age and Cyptonomicon, legendary stuff.

Also got a stack of books on cognitive AI, relational databases and parallel/grid computing. nice light reading ;)


The Brothers Karamazov ????? Argh! It's so SLOW!

Jakeline 03-05-2003 05:36 PM

THE trilogy? Okay, I'm new to posting here and now I'm going to make some folks hate me...

...

I hated reading THE trilogy. I liked the story, the charactors were cool, but if I had to read one more freakin poem or song, I was going to hold my own private book burning.

I've had people tell me, "Oh, give it another chance. You read them as a kid." Good point. So, prior to seeing any of the LOTR movies, I read the trilogy again (skipping The Hobbit this time). I'm sad to admit that it still didn't really do much for me. I'll go hide my face now..

Jaguar - how did you like Diamond Age? I thought that Zodiac was a ton of fun.


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