What are you reading?

1493 by Charles Mann. It's nonfic about how the Americas and the rest of the world changed as a result of Columbus' voyages.

The Escape by Kol Anderson (Broken series book 3)
Finally much better editing, but now where's the porn?? I WANT MY PORN!

Read The Grownup, by Gillian Flynn a few days ago. An interesting read. Reading Stephen King's latest, The Bazaar of Bad Dreams.

Slogging through Neanderthal, which went from Hmmm to UGH in surprisingly short order. But I'm nearly finished so dang it, I guess I'll keep going.

The Black Knight by Dean Crawford

Prey, by Michael Crichton.

I read "The lost" The search for six of six million" by Daniel Mendelsohn and it was very good but a tough read but well worth it.

Reading both Washington: A Life and Hamilton by Ron Chernow. I'm switching between them.

Just a comment about the book, "The Lost" I hate bad endings and most books I've been reading have so-so endings. The Lost has an exquisite ending. So, if you are struggling with endings, I suggest you check it out even if the book is not your cup of tea. Aloha

mayaone said:

Just a comment about the book, "The Lost" I hate bad endings and most books I've been reading have so-so endings. The Lost has an exquisite ending. So, if you are struggling with endings, I suggest you check it out even if the book is not your cup of tea. Aloha

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Hi Mayaone,
who's the author for that book? (I found three books by that titles in my local library catalog!)
Thanks!

I just finished "Steinbeck, a Life in Letters." An absolute must for anyone who is a fan. It's packed full of insight into his character. I can now say I identify with him more than any other writer. It's comforting to know that he felt the same fears and doubts about his own ability that I do at times. Now, I'm back to "The Marauders," by Charelton Ogburn Jr. about the elite unit he served with in Burma.

The Scarlet Gospels by Clive Barker (2015). Hellraiser's Pinhead decapitates various wannabie wizards in a surprisingly splatterpunk prologue, after which the real story starts.
Like King and Koontz and McCammon in the last half a decade, Barker has now also regressed to using mechanical technique in lieu of the more authentic linguistic inspiration that this wave of writers had at 20 something, 30 something, 40 something, and even at some points at 50 something. Which is fine, I've made my peace with that, and so far it's like reading a more brutal Brian Lumley or a very minimalist James Herbert/Graham Masterton* book. Good enough, in this day and age.
Enjoyable.

__
*Who alone remains able to command the same levels of prose force as when 30, 40, and 50, in spite of also being in the 70 bracket now. All hail Graham Masterton.

Hi Vagough,
The author is Daniel Mendelsohn Aloha

Betsy by Harold Robbins.

Just finished Jayne Anne Phillips "Fast Lanes" (and "Black Tickets" a few weeks ago).

My comments/review is here: http://absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?313679-Jayne-Anne-Phillips

Started The Optimist's Daughter by Eudora Welty last night.

Another month, another update.

Last Finished:
A Sky So Big (Ransom Wilcox and Karl Beckstrand, on Kindle) - A Western "romance" in the fading frontier days of Nevada; a wayward son returns to reclaim the family ranch from a villain set on buying/stealing all the land in the area, as a woman seeks her missing relatives who were unwittingly partners with the bad guy. This was an unfinished manuscript by Wilcox, who was born just after the end of the classic "Wild West" era (only in Alberta, IIRC), drawing inspiration from his own life of ranching. It is not, by any remotely modern standard, a romance; there's a guy, and a gal, and they have some adventures (once they stop hating each other over misunderstandings), but nothing resembling love really occurs between them until the very end. It is, however, an old-school, fast-paced Western, with frequent gunfights and untamed swaths of deadly wilderness and all the trimmings. Horse-lovers beware - the equine death toll is very high, to the point where, if the MCs or their companions even look at a horse, it's sure to either be run to death or shot before they're through with it. As a relic of another era, it's not that bad, if a bit over the top at times (not to mention the last-minute Message), but it'll appeal to fans of elder-day Westerns more than me.

Sharcano (Book 1 of the Sharkpocalypse trilogy, Jose Prendes, on Kindle) - A straight-faced homage to B-grade monster/disaster flicks (such as SyFy's infamous Sharknado series), this one features a global apocalypse starring lava sharks. Yes, sharks made of "living" lava. Dealing with this disaster is a host of characters straight from the genre stock bin: the alpha-male reporter whose past womanizing cost him a relationship with his bitter ex-wife and humanizing young daughter; the sexy single scientist whose focus on her career has cost her her personal life, who is guaranteed to respond, despite herself, to the reporter's potent blend of masculinity and vulnerability; the backwoods hicks whose search for Sasquatch lands them right in the middle of trouble as Yellowstone blows its top; the young boy who just wants to save his ailing grandmother; the priest who sees signs of diabolical influence behind the disasters; etc. This one delivers just what you'd expect - a B-movie in a book, with lots of action and forced "human moments" and frequent death and destruction, none of which even tries for logic. The writing's a bit crude and clunky, not just with the potty humor but with pet phrases repeated too many times, not to mention a little repetition in the lava shark attacks. I also got sick of the backwoods comic relief duo, who got way too much page time. Overall, though, it's exactly what it promises to be, not unlike Sharknado.

Currently Reading:
A Fire Upon The Deep (Vernor Vinge, in paperback) - In a galaxy stratified by "zones of thought", from the dense (literally and figuratively) core to the divine fringes, a human expedition unwittingly wakes an ancient malevolence. As the civilized species scramble to figure out just what the threat is and how it can be countered, the sole survivors of the expedition - two children - become marooned on a primitive planet where the vulpine natives are pack-intelligences, single with multiple bodies. So far, it's interesting, though it requires a little commitment to follow, with the mind-bending setup and very alien races. As such, I tend to set it aside for a few days before finding the time to commit to pushing ahead.

Let Them Eat Shrimp (Kennedy Warne, on Nook) - The destruction of global mangrove forests - for real estate, ports, and shrimp farms, among other things - is one of the great unnoticed eco-disasters of the modern age. After that tsunami that wiped out so many people, in part due to the destruction of the mangrove forests that might have buffered the impact (destruction to make way for shrimp farms), I was curious about the things, so I grabbed this during a freebie promotion window. So far, it's interesting, though I'm only one chapter in.

Brightdreamer said:

Another month, another update.


.....
A Fire Upon The Deep (Vernor Vinge, in paperback) - In a galaxy stratified by "zones of thought", from the dense (literally and figuratively) core to the divine fringes, a human expedition unwittingly wakes an ancient malevolence. As the civilized species scramble to figure out just what the threat is and how it can be countered, the sole survivors of the expedition - two children - become marooned on a primitive planet where the vulpine natives are pack-intelligences, single with multiple bodies. So far, it's interesting, though it requires a little commitment to follow, with the mind-bending setup and very alien races. As such, I tend to set it aside for a few days before finding the time to commit to pushing ahead.

.....

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I keep doing the same, though I want to read this, I end up just keeping pushing it aside...

Paulina and Fran by Rachel B. Glaser. It's the author's first novel, although she previously published a collection of short stories and a collection of poetry. Her prose definitely has a poetic feel to it.

Almost done Glamorama, by Bret Easton Ellis. This is my third Ellis novel and though I enjoy his stories, his prose can be a struggle to read. Despie that, I always come back to his books and will read The Rules of Attraction, The Informers, and Lunar Park in the coming months.

Last Words - George Carlin.

To Kill a Mockingbird
I thought myself an uncultured swine for hardly having read any classics. So I was like, READ THIS ONE and be part of the intellectual world! Be part of people who know literature! Be done with 80 page porn and sagas about kitties!
....I'm sorry, I just don't get the hype, with all the respect I absolutely do have for such an indeed beautifully written piece. Maybe it's because I'm only 8% into the story, but still, I'm missing the action. I will persevere, but I consider it an effort.

Ravioli said:

To Kill a Mockingbird
I thought myself an uncultured swine for hardly having read any classics. So I was like, READ THIS ONE and be part of the intellectual world! Be part of people who know literature! Be done with 80 page porn and sagas about kitties!
....I'm sorry, I just don't get the hype, with all the respect I absolutely do have for such an indeed beautifully written piece. Maybe it's because I'm only 8% into the story, but still, I'm missing the action. I will persevere, but I consider it an effort.

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It starts out slow, but it definitely gets much more interesting further in. The trial scene is absolutely brilliant.

Mhh... well... the scene where the kids comfort the teacher by telling her her silly cat story was fun, was cute and redeeming, so I'll continue reading.