What are you reading now?

[vaticanplum]

I did this, I think it took me about 10 years (and I only read biography's on dead presidents). The hardest part was finding books on some of the more obscure ones--Benjamin Harrison was my white whale, but you won't have a problem until you get to the President's after Van Buren.

The most interesting thing is the fact that history tends to repeat itself, something that most nitwits that report or commentate on today's news do not understand.

Happy reading!

Thanks I'm giving myself some leeway, e.g. when I get to WH Harrison I think I'll read a book about campaigns because his was more notable than his presidency. It's good to know someone got through a project like this. Looking forward to stuff like Nathaniel Hawthorne's biography of Franklin Pierce.

The context is totally the most interesting part, including the way things do repeat...especially for someone like me who has trouble remembering chronology. This makes everything make that much more sense. The other thing that has proven interesting is getting a fuller picture of presidents and events by reading about them in very different surrounding books. I was trying to avoid the 1000-page Jefferson biography, but he's played such an enormous and contrasting role in both of the first two biographies, far more than Washington and Adams played in each other's. So I think he deserves a huge book. That dude was ALL over the place.

But right now I am reading "Bonk" by Mary Roach and some Sam Shepard plays.

Great suggestions in this thread as always.

[SandyD]

Currently reading:

The Three Musketeers
The Lost German Slave Girl
It Happened in New Orleans
Dear Husband

[Strikes Out Looking]

Just finished Game Six. Man, I miss the Big Red Machine.

[WMR]

Anyone ever read any Hubert Selby Jr.? Just read 'Last Exit to Brooklyn' again and started re-reading 'The Demon.' He has such a unique style and vision; definitely one of my favorite authors.

[reds1869]

Stuff White People Like by Christian Lander. Being from an English/German background and marrying into a German/Irish family, it's like the book was written about my relatives. Funny stuff.

[Eric_the_Red]

Quiet Strength by Tony Dungy. I'm looking forward to reading Uncommon, his second book, when I am done with this one. His leadership and faith is inspiring.

[Kingspoint]

A May, 1866, Harper's Pictorial Weekly, that put together a compilation of what happened to the best of their ability from both sides of the Civil War from 1861-1865. The book is 12-1/4 x 15-1/4 inches in size so it can include engravings and maps. 836 pages. It's more descriptive than story-telling, so it can be really dry quite often. Since it was put together in 1866, it also was written to a well-educated audience. That's how they wrote most of their works back then, not to 12-year old comprehensions like they do now. I thought I had pretty good comprehension when it came to reading, but this is very difficult. It's common for a sentence to run on for 10 lines, while put together in a fashion similar to the Constitution of the United States.

It makes me tired quickly when I'm reading it if it's late at night. I love it, though, as it's from first hand accounts throughout.

[Roy Tucker]

Reading "The Tourist" by Olen Steinhauer. Excellent spy book in the vein of John Le Carre. "Tourists" are CIA killer spies who are highly lethal, surpassingly cynical vipers. The main character is Milo Weaver who was a tourist, left the game, but got sucked back in.

You really have to read it carefully. There are multiple names, opaque motives, deceptive marching orders and vast capacities for duplicity. Lots of "holy crap" moments. Quite the ride if you like the genre. Roy give it 5 stars.

[nate]

OK, I have to give a shout-out to Redszone's own RedsManRick for this one. On one of my pedantic "streakiness" tangents, he suggest I read "The Drunkard's Walk" by Leonard Mlodinow. I did and now would categorize my mind to be sufficiently "blown."

Well, not "blown" so much as...I dunno...having someone with much more intellectual "thunder" co-sign for me.

I highly recommend reading it if you haven't.

[TRF]

Has anyone read Good Omens? I just started it, and its hilarious.

[Hoosier Red]

Just finished "Codex" by Lev Grossman, I had read "The Magicians" earlier and feel like I always like his books but the endings make me just feel meh.

[RichRed]

"Notes From a Small Island" by Bill Bryson. Bryson never fails to crack me up.

[RedsManRick]

OK, I have to give a shout-out to Redszone's own RedsManRick for this one. On one of my pedantic "streakiness" tangents, he suggest I read "The Drunkard's Walk" by Leonard Mlodinow. I did and now would categorize my mind to be sufficiently "blown."

Well, not "blown" so much as...I dunno...having someone with much more intellectual "thunder" co-sign for me.

I highly recommend reading it if you haven't.

No problem, Nate. I'm now reading another book in the same vein, Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. This is the book that preceded The Black Swan.

[westofyou]

Just finished "The Machine", thought it was good, kinda soft in content, very dumbed down, likely to reach a wider audience.

Currently reading

Diamond Appraised: A World-Class Theorist and a Major League Coach Square off on Timeless Topics in the Game of Baseball, By Craig Wright and Tom House.

[Scrap Irony]

Has anyone read Good Omens? I just started it, and its hilarious.

Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett Good Omens? I loved it. Pratchett is one of my absolute favorites. I highly, highly recommend his other works, especially his Ankh-Morph novels.