What are you reading now?

[Lou]

So it turns out that there are two versions of the Omnivores Dilemma. I was reading it on my Kindle and about the time I got to chapter two I realized I was reading the Young Readers version. I have the right version on hold at the library.

I got the Kindle version of Eating Animals. But there is something wrong with the formatting so I am getting the hardcover version. But I did get as far as chapter two, too. The section where he suggests we turn homeless dogs into pet food, I thought was very Johnathan Swift like.

Anyway, I have had the Kindle version of the Alchemist on my Kindle forever. I decided that it was time to read it.

The Alchemist ​

by Paulo Cohelo

This book is very popular.
According to the Huffington Post,

The Alchemist has sold 65 million copies and been on The New York Times bestseller list for more than 315 weeks. It’s also been translated into 80 different languages, setting the Guinness World Record for the most translated book by any living author.​

It's also been recommended to me by a number of friends.

However, I thought it was sort of lame. The message seemed to be contradictory and pseudo-mystical. Maybe I'm missing something. The whole thing is told like its a parable. But I didn't quite see anything in it that hasn't been said before - and much clearer - and with fewer words.

The ending was surprising. I may have to sit and think about it some more.

 

[Forest Nymph]

I heard this is really disturbing but there's a movie of it, it's about a person who has a psychic dream insight becoming vegetarian and her family basically torturing her. It was in my college library. I got it. Shhhh.

The Vegetarian by Han Kang

This is my next casual read, that isn't school stuff.

I am kind of perpetually in the middle of reading Carry Tiger to Mountain by Stephen Legault, which is an environmentalist activist view of the Tao te Ching, and he's a lot like me, he says he started out really angry as a teen watching people destroy his favorite place in nature, and even as an adult considered himself "an impatient man" but then goes on to explain how the Tao helped him understand better how to run his environmental non-profit and generally do activism, and I love this because I've been interested in the Tao since my twenties. So maybe this will help, we'll see.

I also started essays in In Defense of Animals: The Second Wave edited by Peter Singer, which is a very academic book, but in short, manageable bites, right before school started. I'll probably finish it off and on by the summer.

 

[Sax]

Finally finished Farthest North. I'm always amazed how tough those early polar explorers were.

Currently reading another Kim Stanley Robinson novel...Aurora, about a generation ship near the end of it's voyage to another star. His writing is pretty different than his earlier stuff I've read...much easier to read fast.

 

[Forest Nymph]

I still have a section of The Vegetarian left, because it is pretty dang disturbing, plus school work makes me not want to read other stuff as much (unless it's forums or news, etc.)

I did just start listening to Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey on audiobook. I think audiobooks might be the "happy medium" for me during the semester. Even if I don't have the energy or desire to read another book, it's cool to be told a nice story. I remember listening to Agatha Christie audiobooks to relax while I was in school when I was younger.

 

[Deleted member 3018]

I think Joanne Harris must be one of my favorite writers. I'm reading The Gospel of Loki. It's awesome this far.
It is written in english so I was afraid that it would be difficult for me, but I read it pretty fast. I think I have gotten better at english, thanks to this forum!

Other books from Harris that I have read and loved:

Chocolat
The Lollipop Shoes
Peaches For Monsieur le Curé
It's a series, and still unfinished. So there might be more to come.

 

[Deleted member 3018]

The Alchemist ​

by Paulo Cohelo

This book is very popular.
According to the Huffington Post,

The Alchemist has sold 65 million copies and been on The New York Times bestseller list for more than 315 weeks. It’s also been translated into 80 different languages, setting the Guinness World Record for the most translated book by any living author.​

It's also been recommended to me by a number of friends.

However, I thought it was sort of lame. The message seemed to be contradictory and pseudo-mystical. Maybe I'm missing something. The whole thing is told like its a parable. But I didn't quite see anything in it that hasn't been said before - and much clearer - and with fewer words.

The ending was surprising. I may have to sit and think about it some more.

I don't wish to be rude to anyone. Or make assumptions based on nothing but instinct. So I'm terribly sorry about what I'm going to say. And I take full responsibility.

I think Paulo Coelho might drink too much. That's the vibe I get from his books. His books are lame. He is trying to convince people that he holds some secret wisdom, and fails.

But I don't know. It has been a while since I read anything from him. Maybe he is so wise, that I'm just too dimwitted to get him.

 

[Lou]

I don't wish to be rude to anyone. Or make assumptions based on nothing but instinct. So I'm terribly sorry about what I'm going to say. And I take full responsibility.

I think Paulo Coelho might drink too much. That's the vibe I get from his books. His books are lame. He is trying to convince people that he holds some secret wisdom, and fails.

But I don't know. It has been a while since I read anything from him. Maybe he is so wise, that I'm just too dimwitted to get him.

I thought it was lame too.
But like you I figured it's so popular. Maybe I'm not getting it.

 

[Sax]

I did just start listening to Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey

That one's on my reading list! I'm planning a trip to Utah, but there's so much I want to see and do it's tough narrowing things down.

 

[Deleted member 3018]

But actually, alcohol problem doesn't make a person a bad writer. Like for example, Stephen King is one of the most best writers there has ever been, and he was alcoholic. Stephen Kings The Shining and the sequel, Dr. Sleep are some of my favourite books ever written. The movie Kubrick made is merely loosely based on the book.

I found this hour long video of him and George RR Martin talking. I thought it was awesome. Two twisted minds sharing experiences.

 

[Deleted member 3018]

I thought it was lame too.
But like you I figured it's so popular. Maybe I'm not getting it.

Yup. It's a mystery.

 

[TofuRobot]

I am one of those (apparently very odd) people who doesn't read fiction. pretty much my whole life I've spent reading to learn something or to learn how to do something. The current books in my Amazon shopping cart are about investing, and real estate, but I'm too busy studying Spanish, and reading a textbook for class, "Hacker Techniques, Tools, and Incident Handling 3rd Edition." Current topic: cryptographic systems, PKIs, symmetric and asymmetric algorithms, hashing, CAs, and key management.

All that said, I did read the books they made you read in school/college. 'A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812' was very interesting (though not fiction), and I read The Shining, and Amityville Horror when I was 12, both of which I couldn't put down. I've never found a fictional book "gripping" enough since - though I really can't stand scary stories anymore after those, LOL

 

[Deleted member 3018]

though I really can't stand scary stories anymore after those, LOL)

Same. I don't enjoy that much horror or gore now-a-days, but I can understand people who write that kinda stuff, because after I almost died, 7 years ago, I have had these visions and also a compulsive need to write them down. Haha. So I write horror and gore, but I don't like to read those, at least usually I don't.

I like to read so that I could learn something new, as well, so we are odd together. Right now I'm learning about Myths.

 

[Lou]

I am one of those (apparently very odd) people who doesn't read fiction. pretty much my whole life I've spent reading to learn something or to learn how to do something. The current books in my Amazon shopping cart are about investing, and real estate, but I'm too busy studying Spanish, and reading a textbook for class, "Hacker Techniques, Tools, and Incident Handling 3rd Edition." Current topic: cryptographic systems, PKIs, symmetric and asymmetric algorithms, hashing, CAs, and key management.

All that said, I did read the books they made you read in school/college. 'A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812' was very interesting (though not fiction), and I read The Shining, and Amityville Horror when I was 12, both of which I couldn't put down. I've never found a fictional book "gripping" enough since - though I really can't stand scary stories anymore after those, LOL

You might like Cryptonomicon by Neil Stephenson

 

[Lou]

Same. I don't enjoy that much horror or gore now-a-days, ell, so we are odd together. Right now I'm learning about Myths.

I like suspenseful. Horror completely turns me off. When I was like eight I watched on TV Abbott and Costello meet Frankenstein. From under the couch.

But for some reason, I am a fan of Hand-Held Camera Films. I was worried about watching the Blair Witch Project but my nephew assured me I would be OK. The ending gave me nightmares. Cloverfield was OK. I thought the scary parts were funny.

Stephen King is such a good writer I ended up reading most of his books. But I skip the films made from his books. I had a roommate who had all the Dean Koontz books. He insisted I try them. I read like four. But basically, they all had the same plot.

 

[Deleted member 3018]

I like suspenseful. Horror completely turns me off. When I was like eight I watched on TV Abbott and Costello meet Frankenstein. From under the couch.

But for some reason, I am a fan of Hand-Held Camera Films. I was worried about watching the Blair Witch Project but my nephew assured me I would be OK. The ending gave me nightmares. Cloverfield was OK. I thought the scary parts were funny.

Stephen King is such a good writer I ended up reading most of his books. But I skip the films made from his books. I had a roommate who had all the Dean Koontz books. He insisted I try them. I read like four. But basically, they all had the same plot.

I have't heard of Abbott and Costello meet Frankenstein, but I know the feeling. I used to play Amnesia: The Dark Descent, or tried, but every time that monster came, I felt like going into hiding (in real life too) and when the Sanity of the character dropped low, I was in the same mood as him, going out of my mind lol. So if you like suspense, you'll love Amnesia. Suspense kills my nerves, but it's also interesting. I wonder why does it work, even though we know that the monster can't hurt us in real world? And does it work on everyone, or only to some?

Oh, damn. Why do we humans watch movies that give us nightmares, when we know we shouldn't?

For some reason, the book is always better. Perhaps because of the budget, or because you have imagined in your head , how it should look like, and thus the movie disappoints. Some people complain that there isn't enough blood, on the war scenes, in The Lord of The Rings movies, and that it should be more realistic. But to me that doesn't matter. If Peter Jackson would have wanted to make a splatter film, he would have been fully capable of that.
I tried to read Koontz as well, but it wasn't for me. I read only couple of pages and gave up, some books just don't caugth my attention. Good to know that I didn't miss anything.

 

[amberfunk]

Rereading American Gods by Neil Gaiman again for about the third or fourth time. He's one of my favorite writers. I'm taking a break from reading Anne Rice's vampire chronicles again. Lestat's character gets to be too much sometimes. I have seven books still to read in that series and then some more branched off ones. Probably will go back into reading Mary Roach's books before I get back to Anne Rice.

 

[Lou]

I like Neil Gaiman, too. I really liked Stardust. I suppose you know this but there was an American Gods TV show.

 

[amberfunk]

I like Neil Gaiman, too. I really liked Stardust. I suppose you know this but there was an American Gods TV show.

Yep, I own the first season. The second season comes out next month.

 

[Sax]

Grass by Sheri Tepper. Palace intrigue + sci-fi mystery scratched an itch I didn't know I had.

 

[Emma JC]

I am one of those (apparently very odd) people who doesn't read fiction. pretty much my whole life I've spent reading to learn something or to learn how to do something.

I love how we can similar interests and diverse interests.... I am almost the exact opposite. I do read non-fiction, sometimes, however I devour fiction incessantly. I probably read 4 or 5 novels per week. For me a new Danielle Steel or Nora Roberts is like a chocolate bar (vegan, of course). I usually look in the new book section at the library and when I find an author that I like I then read all the others written by them.

With these books I travel vicarously all over the world and through different periods of time. I travelled a lot when when I was in my 20's and 30's and this form of travelling is a lot easier and less expensive.

Emma JC