What are you reading?

kland01s


Not sure the title of what I'm reading something like the Kindness of Strangers about a guy who travels across the US without any money or transportation in search of the meaning of life. Best part...... I'm reading it on my new Kindle!!! A freebie.

Is it a Lee Child book, Jack Reacher carachter?

Readind Stuart Wood's latest, DC  Dead! Stone Barrington, my man!

Reading Stuart Wood's latest, DC  Dead! Stone Barrington, my man!

I just finished an excellent little book called "Preachin' The Blues" about the blues singer Son House.  Well written and a quick read, I spent most of Saturday reading it and really enjoyed it.

Been reading quiet a bit lately. Finished two books from the Hard Case Crime imprint, which publishes a mixture of original and vintage crime novels. I got HCC books from Lawrence Block, The Girl With The Long Green Heart and A Diet of Treacle. Enjoyed them both quite a bit. The Girl With The Long Green Heart is about a couple of grifters pulling one over on what they think is the perfect mark. A Diet of Treacle is set on the outskirts of the "Beat" world of 1950s NYC. It's pretty dark.
 
Also read Michael Connelly's The Brass Verdict which brings together his Harry Bosch and Mickey Halley series into one book and his A Darkness More Than Night, which also features Bosch. I really like Michael Connelly.

I just finished a Kindle book, Race Against the Machine How the Digital Revolution is Accelerating Innovation, Driving Productivity, and Irreversibly Transforming Employment and the Economy by Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee.

The Affair - Lee Child.  Can't put it down!

Reading my absolute favorite current author, F. Paul Wilson's just re-released REPRISAL...one hell of a read!!!!

Now I am reading "Guide to the Alaska Highway" by Ron Dalby in prep for our summer drive to Alaska.

Ameritopia by "The Great One".

A fascinating book titled " Grant's Final Victory" about the last year of his life.  Really amazing.
And another, "Beaten, Sauced, and Seared"  by Jonathan Dixon a recent graduate of the Culinary Institute of America ( CIA). 

jman


Ameritopia by "The Great One".

Ditto.
 
Great stuff!

Sherlock Holmes & the Red Demon...by John H. Watson, M.D.; edited by Larry Millett
 
Supposed "lost" Watson manuscript of a Holmes case set in Minn. Millett does a good job of capturing Doyle's style & spirit.

Larry Millet is a Twin Cities architectural historian and former St. Paul Pioneer Press reporter.
 
http://www.larrymillett.com/

Just finished Homer Hickam's latest novel, "The Dinosaur Hunter" about amateur paleontologists in Montana.  Not as spectacular as his Coalwood Trilogy (October Sky, The Coalwood Way, and Sky of Stone) which were memoirs of his growing up in coal country.  His first novel of the three was made into the movie "Rocket Boys", which is an anagram of the book's title, October Sky.

Question for Treetop Tom -
Is "The Dinosaur Hunter" appropriate (content and reading-level wise) for a 12 year old boy?  My friends' son has said since he was 4 that he's going to be a paleontologist.  Come to think of it, reading level is probably not an issue - he's above average in that area, so only the content question remains.  Thanks.

I think it would be OK for a 12-year old and he would probably enjoy the dinosaur hunting parts of the story, but there is a love-interest and murder mystery storyline mixed in that he might not find appealing.  I think it may have one instance of the "F" word, too.

"17 Day Diet" which will take more than that to accomphish!

Quick Fixes by F. Paul Wilson....short stories about Repairman Jack!!!

Twilight Eyes by Dean Koontz

I just finished Tom Clancy's "Locked On", the latest of the Jack Ryan series. It is a bit jumpy and pretty unrealistic, but one of the hero's gets chased thru Tom Caudills neighborhood in Maryland, AND I like the Ryan (Senior) character, so I stuck with it thruout...

Sixth Man - David Baldacci. Tough one to put down!

I read quite a lot and I buy most of my books used at McKays in Knoxville.  Outside they have a bin that has free books that nobody wants.  I saw one that caught my eye.  "The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters".  It looked interesting to me so I picked it up and thought no more about it.  I googled it and it turns out that it is out of print and the author "Robert lewis Taylor" won a pulitzer prize for this novel about a 14 year old boy traveling across the USA from Louisville in the 1850's.  It is  Huckleberry Finn on Steroids.  Hard copies of it that are in good shape was listed for sale at $100.00 on Amazon.  This paperback sold for .95  42 years ago.  Double outstanding.
 
Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN 

Nice pick! Does it still have a dust cover?


http://www.amazon.com/Tra...8791958&sr=1-1-catcorr

chewingthefat

kland01s


Not sure the title of what I'm reading something like the Kindness of Strangers about a guy who travels across the US without any money or transportation in search of the meaning of life. Best part...... I'm reading it on my new Kindle!!! A freebie.

Is it a Lee Child book, Jack Reacher carachter?

 
No, the book is non fiction
 
http://www.goodreads.com/.../4619640.Mike_McIntyre

How To Repair Food...by Marina & John Bear...10 Speed Press...ISBN 0-89815-555-X
 

Thanks to Mayor Al, I just bought the latest Tom Clancy novel, at good old Costco, can't even remember the Title, also got Kill Shot, Vince Flynn's latest, Mitch Rapp, oh yeah!
Fishtaco, you on these?

porkbeaks


Nice pick! Does it still have a dust cover?


http://www.amazon.com/Tra...8791958&sr=1-1-catcorr

 
It has a dust cover and the pages are beginning to yellow but still very readable.  Great adventure story. No wonder it won a pulitzer prize
 
Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN

Chewie,  My Clancy was a Costco buy also.  Let me know what you think of it.   It is ingrained in my brain that as I read these, the Harrison Ford image of Jack Ryan is pretty consistent...but not the John Clark image from 'Clear and Present Danger'. Who do you visualize as John Clark, or Jack Junior? Or Domingo Chavez???  I enjoy putting images to characters in these stories. After serveral volumes, you 'get to know then' fairly well.

Al and Chewie:  I liked all the Clancy books except the ones with the co writer.  I thought they were awful.
 
Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN 

mayor al


Chewie,  My Clancy was a Costco buy also.  Let me know what you think of it.   It is ingrained in my brain that as I read these, the Harrison Ford image of Jack Ryan is pretty consistent...but not the John Clark image from 'Clear and Present Danger'. Who do you visualize as John Clark, or Jack Junior? Or Domingo Chavez???  I enjoy putting images to characters in these stories. After serveral volumes, you 'get to know then' fairly well.

Al, that's also something I do but the problem is, most of the well known actors are about 5" 7 or 8, makes it tough to cast them in my mind!

There are "work-arounds" for short actors...
 
One is casting a leading lady that is of similar height...
 
Another is an "apple" or a "half apple"...these are modern versions of an apple crate that short actors stand on...
 
Another is shooting angle, background, and the sense of perspective, something Gollywood manipulates on a regular basis...

I've just completed two great books,"Dark rose", a short well-written book about Portland's political corruption in the first half of the twentieth century, and "Doc"by Mary Doria Russell. It is a historical novel of the first order about Doc Holliday and the earls, cir cal their time Dodge City. I don't know its accuracy but it was a great read and she is a formidable writer. I would check it out.

"Packing for Mars" by Mary Roach. A wonderfully funny and interesting book on the logistics of living in space.

"Folks, this ain't normal" by Joel Salatin,  an organic farmer; a thought provoking treatise on industrial farming, etc.  One main theory, for example,  2 chickens are quieter and easier to raise than 2 parakeets, and they give you eggs. 
"The Great Influenze"  by John M Barry.  Incredible saga of the 1918 flu epidemic that killed more people than any other epidemic.

"Tricky Business" by Dave Barry. If you like Carl Hiiasen, you'll like this. pb

Rules for Radicals, Saul Alinsky
 
For convenience, here is an excellent quality pdf of it:  http://www.scribd.com/fullscreen/82214106

The Corleone Family, Ed Falco...This book is incredibly spellbinding, starts with Vito in 1933!

chewingthefat

mayor al


Chewie,  My Clancy was a Costco buy also.  Let me know what you think of it.   It is ingrained in my brain that as I read these, the Harrison Ford image of Jack Ryan is pretty consistent...but not the John Clark image from 'Clear and Present Danger'. Who do you visualize as John Clark, or Jack Junior? Or Domingo Chavez???  I enjoy putting images to characters in these stories. After serveral volumes, you 'get to know then' fairly well.

Al, that's also something I do but the problem is, most of the well known actors are about 5" 7 or 8, makes it tough to cast them in my mind!

Clark Gable was 6'; Harrison Ford & Leo DiCaprio are both 6'1"; Connery is 6'2"; Eastwood (is) & Wayne (was) 6'3⁺".  The one physical characteristic actors have in common is disproportionately large heads.  I'm told that large heads "shoot better"; why this is I have no idea.  It was certainly true of my all-time favorite film actors, Spencer Tracy, Humphrey Bogart, & Al Pacino. 

Bruce Cameron's A Dog's Journey". sequel to the #1 Best Seller, "A Doug's Purpose". Superb novel from a dog's perspective...funny and a tear jerker, too.'''with a wild twist!! Love both...soon to be, as they say, a mojor motion picture. Urge you to read it before the movie comes out!!

Did a bunch of this thread go missing?

There are two similar threads going at the same time, I think.
 
What are you reading right now?

OK, that makes sense.
 
Am I required to post the same thing in both places?