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Himself

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Everything posted by Himself

  1. Continued to read Catch-22 and I'm loving it. Start Siddhartha, by Herman Hesse. Very interesting so far.
  2. I am loving Catch-22 so far. I have broken into laughter a few times in the first 60 odd pages. Why was no one telling me to read it?
  3. Some of you may be excited to see my updated "currently reading" section. @Poppyshake They are still worth a read, and are very short.
  4. Got caught up with school so haven't had much time to review, but I have still been reading as an escape... Was away for a week in the Hague for a MUN conference, didn't take laptop. Read a lot there. I swear, I will get to Catch-22 eventually!
  5. Sat down a finished up a few books I'd been working on recently (Death of Ivan Ilyich, Portnoy's Complaint, and King Lear). Will get some reviews up soon. Started Contact, by Carl Sagan. I also took to making my priority list for my coming reads, in no particular order: Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess Catch-22, Joseph Heller Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, James Joyce The Sound and the Fury, William Faulkner Notes from Underground, Fyodor Dostoevsky Gravity's Rainbow, Thomas Pynchon Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro Zeitoun, Dave Eggers The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, Michael Chabon Hopefully I'll be able to work through these pretty quickly. So much great stuff to read, can't wait to dig in. Any recommendations on where to go first would are very welcome.
  6. Continuing to make my way through Portnoy's Complaint. I am really, really enjoying it.
  7. On recommendation of my Dad I began Portnoy's Complaint. I will probably read Catch-22 third of those three. I am definitely looking forward to it now.
  8. Began Portnoy's Complaint. I think I am going to enjoy this.
  9. Hmmm. I don't know what to read next! Top of my list are: Portnoy's Complaint, Philip Roth; Prelude to Foundation, Isaac Asimov; and Catch-22, Joseph Heller. Any preferences?
  10. Point Omega, by Don Delillo Synopsis: In the middle of a desert ‘somewhere south of nowhere’, to a forlorn house made of metal and clapboard, a secret war adviser has gone in search of space and time. Richard Elster, seventy-three, was a scholar – an outsider – when he was called to a meeting with government war planners. For two years he tried to make intellectual sense of the troop deployments, counterinsurgency, orders for rendition. He was to map the reality these men were trying to create. At the end of his service, Elster retreats to the desert, where he is joined by a young filmmaker intent on documenting his experience. Jim Finley wants to make a one-take film, Elster its single character – ‘Just a man against a wall.’ The two men sit on the deck, drinking and talking. Finley makes the case for his film. Weeks go by. And then Elster’s daughter Jessie visits – an ‘otherworldly’ woman from New York – who dramatically alters the dynamic of the story. When a devastating event follows, all the men’s talk, the accumulated meaning of conversation and isolation, is thrown into question. What is left is loss, fierce and incomprehensible. Review: Another first experience with an author. Based on this book alone I like Delillo's style. The conversations between Elster and Finley are exceptionally crafted. Elster's probing thoughts on war and life are, at the very least, interest, and, at their best, mind boggling. Delillo manages to expertly twist seemingly banal situations into insights into the feelings and thoughts of his characters, and, by extension, forces the reader to ponder those same issues. This quotation from near the beginning of the book is highly applicable: "The less there was to see, the harder he looked, the more he saw." 4/5
  11. I have not watched it yet, but my friend says that there are a couple major plot differences. I know it starred Stephen Mangan, and he's great. I have it recorded, hopefully I will be able to get to it this weekend.
  12. If you are going to read classics I would not go with one of those. Time Machine is still worth a read, though, and it is very short. My favourite author from the late 19th century and turn of the century period is Joseph Conrad. Give him a try. Will do. I think I am going to read a classic or two next, but I will prioritise him on my sci-fi list. Thanks, you too!
  13. No, it is a Mid 19th century western. Most of the novel is spent following a group of "scalphunters".
  14. Blood Meridian, Cormac McCarthy This is the first Cormac McCarthy book I have read. I found his style a little difficult at first, but eventually I got the hang of it and began to really enjoy read it. Much of the action - and the book is almost entirely action - is extremely concisely written and I often found myself having to read entire passages more than once to really get what was happening. I also had to reread many and much of the soliloquys of the character judge. This book is violent. Easily the most violent book I have read. Fortunately McCarthy does a truly excellent job with the - many - violent scenes, so there is no feeling of gimmick. It is comparable to a Peckinpah film, in terms of shear gore. I want to go back and read this again at some point. 4/5
  15. Continuing to make my way through Blood Meridian. It's intense.
  16. 1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen 2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien 3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte 4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling 5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee 6 The Bible - 7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte 8 1984 - George Orwell 9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman 10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens 11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott 12 Tess of the D�Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy 13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller 14 Complete Works of Shakespeare 15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier 16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien 17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk 18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger 19 The Time Traveller�s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger 20 Middlemarch - George Eliot 21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell 22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald 23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens 24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy 25 The Hitchhiker�s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams 26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh 27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky 28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck 29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll 30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame 31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy 32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens 33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis 34 Emma - Jane Austen 35 Persuasion - Jane Austen- 36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis 37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini - 38 Captain Corelli�s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres 39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden 40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne 41 Animal Farm - George Orwell - 42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown 43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez 44 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving 45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins 46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery - 47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy- 48 The Handmaid�s Tale - Margaret Atwood 49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding 50 Atonement - Ian McEwan 51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel 52 Dune - Frank Herbert 53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons 54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen 55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth - 56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon 57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens- 58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley 59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon 60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez- 61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck 62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov- 63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt 64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold 65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas 66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac- 67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy 68 Bridget Jones�s Diary - Helen Fielding 69 Midnight�s Children - Salman Rushdie 70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville 71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens 72 Dracula - Bram Stoker- 73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett 74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson 75 Ulysses - James Joyce 76 The Inferno - Dante- 77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome 78 Germinal - Emile Zola 79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray - 80 Possession - AS Byatt - 81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens 82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell 83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker 84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro 85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert 86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry - 87 Charlotte�s Web - EB White 88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom 89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle 90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton - 91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad 92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery 93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks 94 Watership Down - Richard Adams 95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole 96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute 97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas 98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare 99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl 100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo 20
  17. Fry's voice is like the audio equivalent of pouring melted chocolate into one's ear. Pure euphony.
  18. The Hitchhiker's Guide is a great series, and the individual books are very quick reads. I'd recommend you give them a read whenever you get the chance.
  19. Reviews at light speed: Dirk gently's Holistic Detective Agency, Douglas Adams Very funny, though not as funny as the Hitchhiker's series, though I enjoyed the references, idea, and stories much more. Give it a read 4/5 The Time Machine, H. G. Wells Long rambling, exceptionally formal sentences. The style of the era, I suppose. Decent sci-fi jaunt across time. 3/5 Breakfast of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut My first experience with Vonnegut; I thoroughly enjoyed it. Vonnegut is extremely witty and deeply sardonic the whole way through. 4/5 Around the World in 80 Days, Jules Verne Similar in style to Wells' Time Traveller. Enthralling enough, but lacking in...something. 3/5 Just updated my TBR pile, added my actual books to the list. 220 books, I'm intimidated.
  20. Projectgutenberg is amazing. A large portion of my e-TBR pile can be traced back to there.
  21. Reviews for my recent reads will come soon, haven't had a chance to type up my thoughts Enjoy might not be the right word, but it is definitely a good read.
  22. Well, you do get a % reading on the bottom of the screen, so you always know where you are, it just won't be as tactile a representation as you would get with a physical book.
  23. Man's Search for Meaning, by Viktor Frankl Let me begin by saying how extremely impressed I am, not only with the book, but with its author. Viktor Frankl was a holocaust survivor who lived through the horrors of Auschwitz and Dachau, as, essentially, a slave labourer and, at times, a doctor. This makes the very objective, yet utterly heartfelt, analysis of the psychology of the holocaust prisoner all the more amazing. His style is excellent, extremely clear, neither verbose nor laconic, yet he wastes not a single word. The second part of the book deals more directly with the school of psychotherapy he developed, called logotherapy. Many of my own thoughts are echoed in his writing, with regards to the source and, by extension, methods of treatment for sufferers of mental illness. That is not to say there are not points on which I disagree, but they are incidental to the thrust of his school of thought. Please read this. 5/5
  24. I finished Man's Search for Meaning and began Labyrinths by Borges.
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