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Just finished "Death of the Liberal Class" by pullitzer prize winning journalist Chris Hedges. Was the Middle East bureau chief for the NY Times who got canned by them. An extremely profound book on the state of our nation. Youtube his interviews if interested. PM me with impressions.
 


Second "Joe Pitt" novel I've read. I think someone here might have recomended them. They're good, but not great. They're definately not 'detective' novels, although I do enjoy the ultra violence and novel use of vampires.
 
Just finished wizards first rule. The sword of truth series. Very good. Just ordered all 12 books. Can't wait to get back into that world.

Terry goodkind.
 
Finished Founding Brothers and White Noise.

Founding Brothers was surprisingly good, especially the first half of the book. I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys US history and is interested in a deeper understanding of the individuals who made the "Great Experiment" work.

I usually enjoy satires but White Noise was not my cup of tea. I had to fight my way to finish the last third of the book. It started out with some interesting commentary on life in a media-saturated society that is bogged down by commercialism, easy living and the idea of safety. But it ultimately ends up being a tale about hopelessness that lacks any redeeming characters. Truth be told, about half way through the book I was hoping they would all off themselves.

Currently finishing up Emperor of all Maladies and just started Matterhorn by Karl Marlantes

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Finished Half the Blood of Brooklyn. Great ending but the main character just seems to take everyone else down way too easily.
 
[quote name='Mr_hockey66']Just finished wizards first rule. The sword of truth series. Very good. Just ordered all 12 books. Can't wait to get back into that world.

Terry goodkind.[/QUOTE]

Curious what you think of the rest. I loved the first one and they got more and more silly each new book.
 
Ordered the first 4 books of the Song of Fire and Ice series from Amazon yesterday. Will be starting that the moment it gets here.
 
Finished reading Matterhorn. I simply can't say enough good things about it. It's the best book I've read this year. Hell it might even be the best book I've read over the last two or three years. A must read.
 
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Blink is really good, probably my favorite of his books.

The Tipping Point is also very good if you haven't read it. There's a newer one as well, but it's just a collection of his articles for the New Yorker and other shorter pieces.
 
Can someone explain why Blink was good? As I read the book it basically argued judging a book by its cover is a-ok and that irrationality is not irrational.
 
[quote name='cindersphere']Can someone explain why Blink was good? As I read the book it basically argued judging a book by its cover is a-ok and that irrationality is not irrational.[/QUOTE]

It was more about how humans can make snap judgments, and how sometimes they are accurate--like the guy who could predict whether a tennis player would double fault or not with incredible accuracy--and how sometimes they were reflective of biases regarding race etc.

But on the balance, it was more about the ability of humans to quickly and mostly accurately form perceptions of things and make decisions in a blink.

I just thought it was interesting for a psychology point about how the human brain works.
 
Finished Pride and Prejudice.

Also finished the Watchman graphic novel I checked out from the library.

Up next:
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Picked up the paperback for .50 cents in the used book section at the library.
 
On Vaca next week so i picked up:

UFOs:Generals,Pilots and Government officials go on the record.
&
Towers of Midnight (the wheel of time book 13)
 
Took a break from re-reading/reading The Malazan Books of the Fallen to read Hard Magic by Larry Correia. It was an excellent, quick read and I recommend it highly.
 
Just finished reading The Emperor of All Maladies by Siddhartha Mukherjee. The book is breathtaking. It is a must read for anyone involved in science, research, medicine, cancer patients and cancer survivors... or anyone who is interested in history/biography of cancer. The book is incredibly well written. It presents a very difficult topic in a compelling manner, providing the most up to date research data and treatment methods in combating this deadly disease.

I'll end my review of the book with one of the first quotes of the book...

"Illness is the night-side of life, a more onerous citizenship. Everyone who is born holds dual citizenship in the kingdom of the well and in the kingdom of the sick.

Although we all prefer to use only the good passport, sooner or later each of us is obliged, at least for a spell, to identify ourselves as citizens of that other place." - Susan Sontag

I highly recommend this book to all fellow CAGs.
 
Re-reading The Bonehunters by Steven Erikson. Up next is Return of the Crimson Guard by Ian Cameron Esslemont and then The Hot Gate by John Ringo.
 
I've done three books by Erikson. Need to start on the 4th. Those books are a monster to get through. I need to have wikipedia open to keep everything straight.

This is what I'm reading now


Which unfortunately seems to be more of a "thirlller/chase" book. The plot is straight out of Enemy of the State or Pelican Brief. " We have this item. We don't know what it is! People are chasing and trying to kill us for it!" :rolls eyes:
 
Finished The Kite Runner. Fantastic book.

Now reading:

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Worked out well that it popped up as available in my library e-book queue right after I finished. It's already covered a lot of the Afghanistan history touched on in The Kite Runner, making it an interesting read.

I picked up A Thousand Splendid Suns, Kahlid Hosseini's second book, from the library when returning Watchmen yesterday as well and will read that next.
 
Just finished
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Good stuff. Less "It was the easiest thing in the world to blink and fix everything" than previous books (though of course it was there).

Just started

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I didnt even bother finishing that Jack McDevitt book. Started reading Bandits.


Which is pretty much just like every other Elmore Leonard novel. For only $0.50 at used book sale you probably can't go wrong.
 
Well, I'm currently reading "The Art of War" by Sun Tzu, great book thus far. Even though Sun Tzu lays out military strategies and how to become effective in war, one can still apply such tactics into real life situations, careers, and school as well.
 
[quote name='Mr Unoriginal']Curious what you think of the rest. I loved the first one and they got more and more silly each new book.[/QUOTE]

I remember I borrowed the first book from a friend a bunch of years ago (16 or so) and then I got some from books last year from the mother in law for Christmas. One of the books I got was the last book in the series so I felt obligated to read the middle books in the series.


I liked them well enough even though I'm more of a Sci-fi guy. I could have done with all the big speeches about how love conquers all and the fact that every time they "win" at the end of a book it's because magic just popped out of nowhere and saved them.
 
[quote name='Mr Unoriginal']I think Ender's Saga sucked horribly and would skip it if I were you. If you wanted a book that was any more different than Ender's Game, then read Speaker for the Dead. If you want more Ender's Game goodness then just move on to the Shadow's Series, which is great as well.[/QUOTE]


I really liked Ender's Shadow (the only one of the series that I liked).

I got that book from my mom for a birthday one year. Half way through reading it, I realized that I knew the ending to the book. It turns out a friend of mine was reading Ender's game in the car many years before that and "spoiled" the surprise ending for me so I never did read Ender's Game.

Something similar happens to me all the time. I'll get a book and start reading it and then have a holy shit moment and realize that it's a sequel to a book I've read years before.
 
[quote name='Jam Of Truth']Just started:

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I like Richard Knaak, he really knows how to handle gamelore.[/QUOTE]

As much as I like Richard Knaak and love Warcraft, I find this book very lacking. Stormrage is probably my favorite character from the Warcraft lore and the book just seemed empty to me. You might find it different, though. I'm still wondering when and if the next WoW book will come out.
 
just finished night of the living trekkies, read like a decent scifi channel movie. now reading singularity sky. spies with sapce ships and nanotech, cool so far.
 
finally got around to reading a game of thrones a few weeks ago, existence of the tv series I suppose helped prompt me to finally read it now waiting for the second from the library, after I finished it started watching the show with my sister.
currently almost done The Ragged Man by Tom Lloyd the fourth book of his Twilight Reign series
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Not usual for this thread but I am asking for suggestions in my next book to read. So I like mystery and sociology-like books. If anyone has any good suggestions please give me one.
 
Well, the most popular mystery (or any book, as far as copies sold) is And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. I just started it on Kindle. Got interested in that after watching that semi-corny Harper's Island on CBS last year and heard it was based on her book.
 
[quote name='crunchb3rry']Well, the most popular mystery (or any book, as far as copies sold) is And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. I just started it on Kindle. Got interested in that after watching that semi-corny Harper's Island on CBS last year and heard it was based on her book.[/QUOTE]
Yeah, it is a great book. But i already read all of her works and all of Michael Connely books. And the Millenium trilogy, as much as I could stomach.
 
[quote name='cindersphere']Yeah, it is a great book. But i already read all of her works and all of Michael Connely books. And the Millenium trilogy, as much as I could stomach.[/QUOTE]

Rex Stout is a old-style mystery writer who I started picking up lately. Any of the Nero Wolfe books at least. Also any of the Chandlers, Ross McDonalds, etc.

Almost anything published by Black Lizard is a win if you look pulpy noir-style mysteries.
 
I finished A Thousand Splendid Suns yesterday. Damn good book. I liked The Kite Runner a tad more, but both are fantastic books. Hopefully he publishes a 3rd book soon.

Started up:

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Also reading a book of essays about what Bin Laden's death means for the future of terrorism and other world issues that's edited by Newsweek's Jon Meachem. I checked out the e-book from the library (it's also one of those $2 Kindle shorts).

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Shadow of the Torturer. Which has more florid prose than you would expect in a Sci-Fi/Fantasy novel.


It's slow going so far (60 some pages in) but I'm hoping it will pick up.
 
[quote name='eldergamer']Rex Stout is a old-style mystery writer who I started picking up lately. Any of the Nero Wolfe books at least. Also any of the Chandlers, Ross McDonalds, etc.

Almost anything published by Black Lizard is a win if you look pulpy noir-style mysteries.[/QUOTE]
Thanks I will check these out.
 
just read a Kindle Short call "Scalper" it was pretty cool. a weird little insight of people who make a living off scalping tickets. was only $2

up next Personal Foul by Tim Donaghy the corrupt NBA official, looking forward to reading that being a big NBA fan.
 
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