The Todd wrote:100 pages into Duma Key and loving it-FIVE!!!!!
The Vicar wrote:Started in on Whitley Shreiber's 2012.
I've never read Shreiber before, so if this book blows I'll never let Wiccan Women hear the end of it.
Heh heh.
Ribbons wrote:The book forum needs you!!!
[/gets on knees and grovels pathetically]
Maui wrote:Ribbons wrote:The book forum needs you!!!
[/gets on knees and grovels pathetically]
I'm here, I'm here. Bring forth the books.
Ribbons wrote:Not made to stand in the corner?
Bayou wrote:Just finished up "Brave New World" by Aldous Huxley
I'm not sure how to review this. I know it's a classic and all, but I just couldn't get into it. I liked the overall tone of the book. For me though, it was like reading a short story that got fleshed out and went on for far too long. I found myself skimming quite a few times to get slightly ahead of the monotonous pseudo-scientific bits that had been explained over and over again. Just as I would find myself drawn into something new, a page later I was reading something that had been gone through just a chapter before. The level of explanation for most of the book went from non-existent (Electromagnetic Golf/other assorted sports) to excessively and repetitively detailed (the decanting process). It was like knowing exactly what kind of clothing Captain Nemo wore every day, but only getting brief glimpses at the fantastic craft he piloted.
The ending was a bit milquetoast for me. I was kinda hoping for something more exciting or world changing. Instead I got the theme from M.A.S.H. ...
This is one of those books that I'll probably never pick up again, but I am definitely better for reading it.
After all, a gramme is better than a damn.
Smasher wrote:The 42nd Parallel: Vol. One of the U.S.A. Trilogy, by John Dos Passos
Bloo wrote:Twilight because my best friend told me I should read it and give it a chance instead of mocking it
Maui wrote:The Twilight series are enjoyable reads. I certainly wouldn't call Meyers the best writer on the planet though. I consider them beach books - incredibly light and quick to read. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on the book once you're done.
Bloo wrote:yeah it's got a lot of pages but pretty easy reading so far
Maui wrote:You seen the movie?
Bloo wrote:I haven't, again merciless mocking of the idea behind it made me unwilling to see the movie
Maui wrote:If at all possible, go to a showing when the teeny boppers are in school. It minimizes the squealing and "OH MY GOD" outbursts.
Bloo wrote:my friend's husband read the book before watching the movie and hated it, then went and saw the movie and enjoyed it much more, so much that he went ahead and read the other books, so I've heard good things about it, I'm just one of those get stuck in my own opinon kind of guys, and I hate admiting I"m wrong LOL
Maui wrote:Alot of people are quick to criticize these books without having read them. I wouldn't say they are fantastic but I wouldn't call them bad reading either. Twilight piqued my interest enough that I wanted to continue on with the series.
Bloo wrote:honestly what piqued my intrest enough to agree to read the books was Orson Scott Card's endorsment of them, now that I'm reading it it's not as bad as I thought
Maui wrote:Didn't know he endorsed the series. Interesting.
Bloo wrote:I guess he's been doing some mentoring with her as well, read that in...USA Today back when Breaking Dawn came out
Maui wrote:Interesting tidbit!
I wonder if he was any inspiration for her other novel "The Host" which is Sci Fi.
Bloo wrote:oh I didn't know she had anything but Twilight, crap man she's a fast writer, is that al she does
Maui wrote:Seems to me that would be a fairly lucrative business. Write a few books a year, take the kids to soccer practice, um, spend money! Sign me up, minus the rugrats!
Bloo wrote:crap I'll do it WITH the rugrats
Maui wrote:It just all sounds too MiniVanISH for my tastes. lol
Bloo wrote:yeah but still...multimillion dollars in sales and merchandise and movie rights, writing all day long just living the life
of course if I ever get published/produced, I'll know I'll just spend the money on coke and hookers...coca-cola of course
Retardo_Montalban wrote:I read a book called "Talk of the Devil" by Riccardo Orizio. Orizio is an Italian journalist who interviewed 9 deposed dictators, but was only given permission to quote 8. It's a shame that Orizio couln't publish his interview with the 9th dictator, Valentine Strasser of Sierra Leone. Instead Strasser's story is told in the introduction to the book in the form of a couple paragraphs about his rise fall and current circumstances living homeless in London at the age of 35. Each chapter of the book focuses on interviewing one dictator. The interview is fleshed out with back ground information on the dictator usually as a counterpoint to fallacies and inconsistencies brought up by the interviewee.
The most interesting stories, probably because they are the stories I am most familiar with are Idi Amin (Uganda), Enver Hoxha (Albania), Jean Claude Duvalier aka Baby Daddy (Haiti) and Slobodan Milosevic (Serbia & Yugoslavia). The one Question that Orizio asks all these deposed dictators is " Do you have any regrets". It was amazing the levels of denial that these former dictators possess in response to this question. It shows just how far the human psyche will insulate itself in order to commit horrible evils. Another thing I caught in the book which may not have been intentional is how complicit Italy's involvement was in keeping these horrible dictators in power. Orizio always writes form the Italian perspective, so there is no telling how much of a role the other world powers had in keeping these 3d world countries in turmoil. There is also a lot of talk of the U.S.A's involvement, but that is a country that is hard to ignore in these types of stories.
At the end of the book there is a letter written by Manuel Noriega turning down an interview, because Noriega doesn't feel that he is in the same position as the other dictators. I'm a little disappointed that There isn't more on Noriega, as his turn from America's darling to evil drug runing king pin seemed to turn on the head of a pin. I also visited one of Noriega's houses when I took a trip down to Panama back in 2007.
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