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Post by KoNeko on Feb 12, 2007 13:07:37 GMT -5
I have been trying to cram parts of Three Kingdoms in between my academic reading. It's the whole historical fiction thing about feudal China and the warring kingdoms they had there all post Han dynasty, and I really like it. It's the kind of stories that my grandparents would tell me when I was a kid (people say that it's the Eastern equivalent of the Odyssey or something). So yeah, it's fun reading.
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Post by Ritsu on Feb 25, 2007 19:07:40 GMT -5
I've been reading An Accidental Man by Iris Murdoch for some time now, somehow I find it hard to move on... but I won't give up. Next it's Notes On a Scandal by Zoe Heller.
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Post by hermoine on Mar 5, 2007 11:58:48 GMT -5
I am currently reading Hamlet by the author/dramatist too well-known to even mention in the first place because everyone knows him.
Like most of Shakespeare's other pieces of writings it is exceptional; I'm trying to squeeze in times to read it though. Oh the joy of approaching exams.
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Post by Rue on Jun 3, 2008 7:11:43 GMT -5
I'm currently reading Middlemarch by George Eliot because it's one of Chandra's favourite books and I really love English literature from that general time period. Joe and I are also about to start reading The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger in preparation for the movie coming out in the fall. I read it before on a plane and it was a perfect flight-book because it was simple but got my attention immediately and was exciting throughout. I definitely recommend it.
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Post by Lianne on Dec 29, 2010 15:22:51 GMT -5
Herm i know you posted that so long ago but if you read Hamlet, did you ever get to read the play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead? I recommend it!!
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Post by Fluffy on Dec 29, 2010 18:52:04 GMT -5
(About Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead - Lianne is totally right! I have a huge Ravencrush on Tom Stoppard. Pretty much all you have to do to make me watch a film is mention that he was involved and I'm like, my movie room or yours?)
Li, you mentioned Onion Girl by De Lint on the Facebook group (I am amazed you remembered ) - really, all of his stuff is awesome. Another Canadian author I've recently come to love is Thomas Wharton. He's written some very, very different books, but you would probably like Icefields best out of all of them - it's about a scientist who is helping to survey the Northwest of Canada, and it's got one of the most lovely endings I've ever read.
Forgot to mention: Jay Lake! I bought a big collection of SFF this summer and stumbled across his Mainspring series. He's definitely more on the literary end of the SFF spectrum - for one thing, his characters have shifting spiritual beliefs - but this is steampunk served the way I love it: a fully developed alternate sociopolitical structure with not only awesomely weird but also symbolic gizmos.
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Post by Fluffy on Jan 5, 2011 15:37:00 GMT -5
So I just finished Firmin by Sam Savage and The Good Thief by Hannah Tinti. I loved The Good Thief and... didn't like Firmin. It was just so world-weary in tone. I get tired of that. The Good Thief, on the other hand, had a twisty-turny plot and an incredibly weird cast of characters with pleasant balances of foibles and nobilities, and there was this nifty theme going on with people coming for other people or for specific things vs. waiting.
Now I've started Ruiz Zafon's The Angel's Game and I'm going to give it another few chapters, but I'm just not loving it like I did The Shadow of the Wind.
So (weird coming from me, I know) what should I read next?
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Post by Lianne on Jan 5, 2011 16:26:57 GMT -5
Nialle!! I could recommend you some books i have read, although i fear that my reading level is far below your own
Books that i have read and enjoyed:
Jodi Picoult - The Tenth Circle - I really liked this book. It is about a teenage girl who was raped. Her father has a mysterious background and you kind of get to learn about them both as she deals with her pain, and as he rediscovers himself.
Jodi Pcoult - Songs of the Humpback Whale - This is a story of a woman who leaves her husband and goes on a road trip with her daughter across the country guided by her brother's letters. I loved this book, it jumped around timelines a bit, but it is pretty easy to follow.
Gabrielle Zevin - Elsewhere - A girl's life in the afterworld as she copes with her death.
Aryn Kyle - The God of Animals - I dont really know how to explain this book, i read it close to three years ago and i remember thoroughly enjoying it. It is rare for me to be able to sit and read chapters upon chapters. It is centered around a girl whose mother is sort of damaged i guess, and her father just does what he can to keep their horse farm going. I am terrible at book reviews but its a book i kept to re read another day
We Are Not Unique - Jerry Jordison - This is a different sort of book, Jerry's conversations about one of his patients i guess? About reincarnation and astral travel. His true experiences with past life regressions and stuff like that. Steve read me this book while we were on a 10 day fly in canoe trip for work. We both loved it and it can get you thinking.
Subterranean - James Rollins - My friend Dalton mailed me this book while he was living in Edmonton. I loved it it was a fun read about explorers in caved below the antarctic. Anything is possible!
I have started on a book called The Republic of Trees my friend gave me. She said it is a book you have to pass on after you read it. But i have only read one chapter but i am excited to read more of it soon
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Post by Lianne on Jan 7, 2011 13:31:44 GMT -5
By the way, En, let me know if you do read any of these, or if you have! I would love to hear your thoughts. Even if it is months/years down the line! I never get to discuss my books i read with anyone
That might actually make me more inclined to read too. One can hope haha sometimes i can't find the time!
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Post by Ritsu on Jan 9, 2011 17:14:44 GMT -5
Thinking about the books I've read since the TD hiatus, some authors pop to mind, namely Jonathan Safran Foer, Eugenides' 'Middlesex', Richard Zimler, Sylvia Plath and some discoveries in the Portuguese literature field, like the short-story author Miguel Torga who focused on describing life on rural villages in the mountains up North, near the northern border with Spain.
Right now I'm re-reading the HP saga. I'm halfway through GoF, but I have to confess that I'm rather tired of it. I think I'm gonna take a short break before starting OoTP. I never liked Harry, but only now have I discovered what a stupid guy he actually is. My boyfriend says that if it was Hermione with the scar on her forehead the story would have been solved by book three
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Post by En on Jan 9, 2011 22:03:08 GMT -5
Today I reread a lot of letters that various of you wrote to me in 2002/03.
I'm not sad. Just - we were so young and idealistic and - close.
I missed you.
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Sarah
Gryffindor Head of House
Posts: 2,865
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Post by Sarah on Jan 10, 2011 21:47:25 GMT -5
ah En, that's lovely I've been re-reading messages in my inbox and boy, are they silly! Mostly from 2002 as well, so it's a lark. Currently, I am reading Haunted by the amazing Chuck Palahniuk. I'm sure a lot of you like him just as much as I do. I've read and own all of his novels now (yay!), and Haunted was a very thoughtful birthday gift from my flatmate who, it appears, snooped through my library to find out the one Palahniuk book I don't have. He's so sweet ;D I've just finished a compilation of Tennessee William's plays, and after Haunted, I will begin The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo series by Stieg Larsson. The first two of the trilogy were xmas gifts, and I've heard great things about them, so I cannot wait to begin. Have any of you read Larsson's novels?
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Post by Leia Skye on Jan 10, 2011 22:54:14 GMT -5
Oh, Chuck! I have such mixed feelings about his books. On the one hand, I admire his energy and the ferocity he pours into the words and the characters...on the other hand, does there ALWAYS have to be a twist?! Haha. I also sometimes feel he portrays women very negatively.
I haven't read all of his books. I've only read Fight Club, Choke, and Invisible Monsters. So maybe there is something I'm missing. I did really like Invisible Monsters. The premise was good, really fascinating in that bizarre, twisted way. Choke was kind of disappointing to me, especially compared to something like Fight Club! I couldn't believe they made that into a movie.
Am I missing his good books? Or am I just too picky?
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