What book(s) are you reading right now?

[clamum]

I just finished The Border by Don Winslow. It was by far my favorite book of the series. I also really enjoyed The Force by him, as well.

Currently, I'm really super-excited about Sid Meier's Memoir! A Life in Computer Games. I'm loving reading about the beginnings of some of his masterpieces. It's also entertaining to read about some of his flops. Learning what processes he goes through when planning a new game idea is really insightful.

I'm also reading Exercise of Power: American Failures, Successes, and a New Path Forward in the Post-Cold War World, by Robert Gates, Secretery Defense for both George W. Bush and Barack Obama. Being in the military, I've have a high respect for someone who values what he believes in more than political party affiliation. I don't always agree with what his claims; however, I respect them and realize I may be the wrong one.

That Sid Meier one sounds interesting. I'm actually close to finishing my first (mobile) game and while it's a piece of feces I just wanna complete it and get it out. I recently thought of what I think will a good idea for my next one so I'm looking forward to that one. Might have to pick up the Meier book.

I think I actually have Gates' autobiography, and Stanley McChrystal's too, and I started reading them but haven't finished. I do my reading in bed at night and a Kindle is so much easier to read in bed with lights off than an actual book. Haha, I got a bunch of them that I still need to read.

 

[Mai72]

I've been reading the good book. Ineresting...

 

[DainBramaged]

That Sid Meier one sounds interesting. Might have to pick up the Meier book.

I think I actually have Gates' autobiography...

Duty, his autobiography, was a great book. You can really tell that he cares more about what he believes in than in partisan politics. Kind of a refreshing viewpoint, these days.

The Sid Meier book has been a BLAST, so far. Thoroughly entertaining, nerdy, and enjoyable. I'd definitely recommend it!

 

[clamum]

Yep "Duty" is the one I got. Ugh I wish I read more of my actual books. It's just so much easier on the Kindle.

Finished Ernest Cline's new sequel Ready Player Two. I liked it but not as much as the first one. I felt like his politics were creeping in there but overall I still enjoyed the book.

Reading Bernard Goldberg's Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News. It's a little older book but is still plenty relevant.

 

[MED698]

I am actually reading Identity and Violence by Amartya Sen, it's a bit complicated to read, but very interesting ...

 

[RearAdmiral]

Yep "Duty" is the one I got. Ugh I wish I read more of my actual books. It's just so much easier on the Kindle.

Finished Ernest Cline's new sequel Ready Player Two. I liked it but not as much as the first one. I felt like his politics were creeping in there but overall I still enjoyed the book.

Reading Bernard Goldberg's Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News. It's a little older book but is still plenty relevant.

Had no Idea Ready Player Two was even a thing. I read player 1 and Armada, guess I can pick this up when I need some light reading.

 

[Chaspowr3]

Reading quite a few books:
1) Spies of No Country by Matti Friedman. After finishing Ronan Bergman's Rise and Kill First, a captivating read about Mossad's (Israel's intelligence unit) greatest missions, I was naturally led to Spies of No Country. The latter extensively talks about the four Arab-born Jewish men who performed covert operations in Beirut.
2) Invisible Nation by Quil Lawrence. The book talks about one of history's more persecuted, yet less spoken people - the Kurds. From facing historical persecutions to genocides by Sadaam Hussein to more recently being a target of ISIS, the community has seen it all. Quil talks in length about the community's resilience, survival, and its relentless quest for a homeland. A much-needed work.
3) Their Eyes were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. This is a usual practice of mine to read fiction while immersed in serious historical readings. Just started reading Zora's work, considered to be one of the greatest works to emerge from the Harlem renaissance.

 

[bigi]

The Forever War still in progress of reading it.

 

[JujuFish]

3) Their Eyes were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. This is a usual practice of mine to read fiction while immersed in serious historical readings. Just started reading Zora's work, considered to be one of the greatest works to emerge from the Harlem renaissance.

Pre-pandemic, I joined a book club at my local library. Pretty much every book they pick is one that I wouldn't have chosen to read, so it helped me broaden my horizons. This was one of my favorites.

 

[Stiff Clamp]

I'm taking a look into deep history. With special attention to any accounts currently dismissed as fable or myth or false history. There's facts mixed in now and then with the superstitions and embellishments. So I'm reading . . .

Worlds In Collision - Immanuel Velikovsky . . . mines ancient legends of turmoil in the skies and earth to construct a theory of Venus being a comet at one time, but it got captured in our solar system and is now chafing in a fixed orbit. Velikovsky seems bent on chalking up God's supernatural interactions with Israel to natural phenomenon in Old Testament times. So much crazy. Not sure it's worth reading. He basically cherry-picks quotes from ancient records to construct an arbitrary history. Written in the 1950s I think, as space exploration fever hit. ( What I like about the book is its constant quotes of ancient records from a myriad cultures - exactly the info sources I'm curious about. I just stumbled on an old copy in storage here. I did not buy it. )

The Journey Through Wales and the Description of Wales - Gerald of Wales (a church official in the 1190s) Seems engaging enough just flipping through it, with its commentary on everyday medieval life in Wales. Still reading the book's preface though, so I can't comment much.

The History of the Kings of Britain: An edition and translation of the De gestis Britonum - Geoffrey of Monmouth. English + original Latin narrative presented side-by-side. Read about Brutus' arrival in the island that became Brittania and his finding a place to settle, clearing out the giants existing there. Now the text is moving onto the days of king Leir.

I read a book at work and one at home simultaneously.

Next up, I'll be reading:
The History and Topography of Ireland - Gerald of Wales
The Chaldean Account of Genesis - George Smith
The Mabinogi and Other Medieval Welsh Tales - Patrick Ford
The PRIMARY CHRONICLE of Kyivan Rus': ПовЂсть временныхъ лЂтъ - Dan Korolyshyn (relates the origin of the Ukrainian people and the founding of Kyiv, its capitol)

 

[Muse]

I'm working on a number of books. The one I'm reading right now is one I read a decade or two after it's 1964 publication, in a wonderful English translation from the French:

When the Earth Trembles by Haroun Tazieff

Tazieff was a Russian volcanologist, and something of an adventurer and author. He was among a party of professionals who went to Chile shortly after the monstrous cataclysm of 1960, and the first section of the book focuses on that. He goes on to explain seismology and does a wonderful job of portraying what seem to be the best known major earthquakes in history, and some others in relevant context. With the exception of a technical passage or two it's anything but dry.

I live in earthquake country (1.5 miles from the Hayward Fault running through SF Bay Area), so EQ awareness is something not to be ignored. My local library no longer has it but I found a copy online a few weeks ago.

 

[thedarkwolf]

John Gwynne's The Faithful and the Fallen series. I've read the first two books Malice and Valor both of which were decent to good but now I'm taking a break and reading the second book in Bryce O'Connor's A Mark of Kings series.

 

[Muse]

I'm almost 1/2 way into Voices of 1776, The Story of the American Revolution in the Words of Those Who Were There, by Richard Wheeler. Wheeler wrote a similar book about the Civil War, which I figure is also a great read. I obtained the former because of a comment I encountered online by a person saying it was his favorite book, he keeps coming back to.

This book brings history of the American revolution to life. It puts you right there. I can't imagine a book doing it better. It was a tough, heroic time.

 

[IronWing]

I finished the His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman. The first book is the basis for the The Golden Compass movie. The story is engaging while the characters are kind of stick figures. The books could use an editor as the author tends toward redundancy. Overall enjoyable.

 

[MrSquished]

Re-reading The Geography of Bliss - a fascinating first book by a long time NPR correspondent, well, about Happiness and what defines it, via international travel to different places with different 'happiness' levels

 

[Stiff Clamp]

Cautio Criminalis, or a Book on Witch Trials <--- literally the title
by Friedrich Spee von Langenfeld

Spee was Jesuit priest in the 1600s who was positive innocent individuals were consigned to torture and/or execution for the crime of witchcraft in Germany. In his book he protests the existing legal process, and advocates a legal system less prone to injustice. Basically endeavoring to build the collective conscience. Wrote the book hoping various nobles or princes would read it, but was aware enough to realize they probably wouldn't.

Book tackles all kinds of questions:

"Whether much should be made of denunciations of accomplices in the crime of magic?​

What is to be presumed about women who are found dead in prison?​

Whether a retraction made at the place of execution of a crime previously confessed be granted any weight?​

Whether someone who has confessed to nothing under torture may be condemned?"​

. . .​

and on, and on​

​

Read 20% of the entire thing so far.

 

[Captante]

Just started James Coreys, Leviathan Wakes. *(book 1 of The Expanse)

Bought it quite a while ago right after the Amazon series wrapped up.

 

[Muse]

I finished the His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman. The first book is the basis for the The Golden Compass movie. The story is engaging while the characters are kind of stick figures. The books could use an editor as the author tends toward redundancy. Overall enjoyable.

I checked out Pullman's The Golden Compass from my local library yesterday. Watched the movie last week, did some research and decided the book is probably worth a look at least. The movie is very strong in terms of the sets, costumes, cinematography but I think the knock that it fails in its pacing is accurate. I was annoyed by some thing(s) I couldn't put my finger on, not that I tried, and the ending was just OMG, it can't stop here. Clearly they were trying to set up the sequels but the world wide economic collapse of ~2008 wrecked the planned sequel train.

 

[Muse]

I'm reading No Escape, The True Story of China's Genocide of the Uyghurs by Nury Turkel. I'm over 1/2 way now. This is no ho hum stuff. TBH, I think it's obligatory reading.

In the words of Turkel, “Communist China has created an open prison-like environment through the most intrusive surveillance state that the world has ever known while committing genocide and enslaving the Uyghurs on the world's watch.”

 

[RPD]

Just started James Coreys, Leviathan Wakes. *(book 1 of The Expanse)

Bought it quite a while ago right after the Amazon series wrapped up.

Books are AWESOME if you like sci-fi and if you already watched it on Prime and liked that, you are in for a treat with the books.

 

[JEDIYoda]

The happy Hooker by Xaviera Hollander!

 

[Stiff Clamp]

The Phantom World; or, the Philosophy of Spirits, Apparitions, etc by Augustin Calmet (1751 edition featuring corrections by author)

Augustin Calmet's work, The Phantom World, overviews a rich and varied selection of supernatural tales and beliefs from the stance of the logician. The author compiles testimonies from different places such as Hungary, Poland, Peru, and England and provides his stories with illustrations by famous authors. He seeks to understand the truth behind the stories. For example, what made people believe in good and bad angels, magic, apparitions, vampires, witchcraft, possession by demons, and other mystical stories.

I've now ordered Vol 2 of this work, a treatise which focuses on Vampires and Revenants

 

[thedarkwolf]

The Eye of the Bedlam Bride.....Dungeon Crawler Carl #6
This is the best series I've read in a long time. It is just so stupid and fun.

 

[BarkingGhostar]

Spent Xmas and thereafter re-reading Asimov's Foundation Series (7 books). Then the wife read them for the first time and is now hooked on Asimov. I then hit the first Dune book again. Also just ordered the Robot series and the Caves of Steel series to re-read and for the wife to read for the first time.

 

[SMOGZINN]

The Eye of the Bedlam Bride.....Dungeon Crawler Carl #6
This is the best series I've read in a long time. It is just so stupid and fun.

I agree, great series. I just discovered it recently and have gone through the entire series as audiobooks. The Narration is some of the best I've heard. I'm waiting for the audiobook for the new one. I rarely start unfinished series because I hate waiting.