What are you reading the week of March 23, 2014?

[Goblinmonger]

[pscot]

1. The Last Policeman by Ben Winters

Earth is about to be destroyed by a 6.5 kilometer asteroid, but crime never sleeps. There are 3 in this series so far, which would seem to weaken the basic premise, but hey. It's fiction, right? It's pretty well written, if one doesn't object to 1st person narratives.

[antiquie]

2. Just downloaded #2,

thanks, I didn't know there are more than the first one available on Kindle.

[TexasProgresive]

5. Well you and antiquie got me to download 1 and 2

the 3rd is not available on Kindle until summer.

[scarletwoman]

3. The Last Place on Earth, by Roland Huntford. It's an old book I've had on the shelf for years.

Last edited Sun Mar 23, 2014, 02:20 PM - Edit history (1)

I started it once years ago, but set it aside for some reason and never got back to it.

Now I'm having a wonderful time reading it - I can hardly put it down.

It's the story of the Roald Amundsen and Robert Scott's race to the be the first to reach the South Pole. This book was absolutely vilified in England when it was first published because it totally tore apart the entire heroic mythology that had grown up around Scott. Rather gleefully, I might add, even though the author is British himself.

The book was the basis for a wonderful PBS/Masterpiece Theater mini-series of the same name.

If there's any interest, I'll post more.

(edited for misspelling the author's name - duh!)

[TexasProgresive]

4. Still reading ancient classic scifi

Now it.s The Star Kings by Edmund Hamilton. The main character, John Gordon swaps bodies and times with Zarth Arn some 2000 centuries in the future. What started out as a remedy to a boring life turns in to a series of nightmares as John has to deal with royal intrigue and Galactic wide pending warfare. And on top of that John in Zarth's body falls in love with the wrong woman.

[TexasProgresive]

6. So, Gobie, what are you reading this week?

[SheilaT]

7. Comeback by Richard Stark

who is really Donald Westlake. For those who don't already know, Westlake, who died five years ago, wrote comic crime novels under his own name, and hard boiled ones under Richard Stark. He used other pseudonyms during his career, but a large portion of his work was under either Stark or Westlake.

80 pages in, excellent so far. I'll finish in a day or two.

[TBF]

8. Orange is the New Black -

4 stars.

[SheilaT]

9. In Persuasion Nation.

Short stories by George Saunders. He's actually writing science fiction, only it's not the genre kind because he uses more "literary" conventions. I am really liking his stuff.

[Little_Wing]

10. "Five Days at Memorial" by Sheri Fink *Sorry, guess this should go under Nonfiction*

About the horrific events there during Hurricane Katrina. Tough slow going, but very well written.

Just finished "The Harlot's Tale" by Sam Thomas. A light-reading mystery centered on the life of a 1600s-era midwife. Apparently part two in a series, but for some reason my library (where I found it) does not have the first installment, but it was OK as a stand alone. Not exeptional, to be honest, but an enjoyable read.

Next up is "The Secret History" by Donna Tartt, since I just finished "The Goldfinch" and was very impressed by her writing.

[getting old in mke]

11. _Roald Dahl's Book of Ghost Stories_

edited by (you guessed it) Roald Dahl. 14 stories, 20th century. Dahl has an interesting introduction in which he talks about the difficulty of writing children's literature before seguing into discussing ghost stories.

Listening to: _Portrait of a Spy_ by Daniel Silva. Gabriel Allon #11. Cycles back some to #6, _The Messenger_ to pick up the story of the that nemesis's daughter.

2014: 33 and counting.

[llmart]

12. "The Invention of Wings"

by Sue Monk Kidd. Just started it today, so I can't say what I think of it yet. So far, so good.

Just finished "Hamlet's Blackberry" but that's non-fiction