pontalba Posted February 22, 2011 Author Share Posted February 22, 2011 ^ Well I must definitely read me some Nabokov, asap! I think I only own Lolita, would that suffice? Happy reading! LOL Will suffice, to say the least. Although...for a Nabokov/detective story, I could recommend The Real Life of Sebastian Knight, or even Laughter in the Dark. The latter isn't a real detective story, but a great take on motivations. But all of VN's are IMO. Not that I've read all yet, only about half. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frankie Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 Thanks for the recommendations, I'll see if I can find them at the library next time. I just came from there and I noticed this huge book by him but can't remember the title right now... Anyways, I'm looking forward to reading Nabokov now Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted February 26, 2011 Author Share Posted February 26, 2011 I've reread the first two of Mary Stewart's Merlin Trilogy, The Crystal Cave and The Hollow Hills. I hadn't read them in, must be 20 years. This series was one of my most favorites for many years, and I still enjoyed them tremendously. Stewart puts a very human cast on Merlin the Magician with enough magic left to satisfy. Honor, battles, Kingship, passion, love and sacrifice all entwine for a magical, but very human story that thrills to this day. I've can also recommend and furthermore by Judi Dench, to fans of the Dame. It reads a bit breathlessly, has wonderful anecdotes of her life, so far. Her energy is absolutely amazing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chesilbeach Posted February 26, 2011 Share Posted February 26, 2011 I didn't know Judi Dench had written a book, and although I'm not usually a reader of autobiograpy, I do love Dame Judi, so I might give this one a go, so thanks for pointing it out pontalba. However, I've just had a look on amazon and it's £10.49 for the Kindle version, which is just far too much for me. If it comes down in price, I'll think about getting it then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted February 26, 2011 Author Share Posted February 26, 2011 That does sound high for it, especially for an e-reader! We bought it at the Borders going out of business sale, and while I can't remember the price, it was reasonable, as I'd not have paid that much! I do recommend the hard copy though, the pictures are wonderful of Dench throughout her career, and in so many costumes. I have another by/about her around here, more of a pictorial review sort of thing. Can't find it at the moment, or remember the name though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted February 26, 2011 Author Share Posted February 26, 2011 I just finished A Red Herring Without Mustard by Alan Bradley, and I will say the series is improving by leaps and bounds. I was slightly skeptical at the first one, and found the second one much improved, and this, third one, excellent. First books in a series are always difficult, so much set up, introducing of characters is involved. This has turned into a first rate series, one that I will certainly continue to follow with pleasure. Flavia de Luce is a wonderfully mature girl that admits that it isn't long since she was a child, and finds it difficult to converse with 'children'. Not is she only brilliant, she has a way about her that is interesting. Her thought processes are intricate she exhibits a sense of who she is, and the responsibilities of her family and herself to the surrounding characters. The mysteries themselves are improving too, to my mind, and will continue as the peripheral characters are developed and fleshed out. I can highly recommend this series. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Janet Posted February 28, 2011 Share Posted February 28, 2011 Just out of interest really, do autobiographies on e-readers have the photographs? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted February 28, 2011 Author Share Posted February 28, 2011 Just out of interest really, do autobiographies on e-readers have the photographs? I wonder the same myself, haven't a clue. I do have to think that even if e-readers, ordinary ones, the black and white variety that I have, don't. And even if they do, I have to say that I still prefer the book in hand for pictures as well. Call me old fashioned or a dinosaur, but that's my preference. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Janet Posted February 28, 2011 Share Posted February 28, 2011 Mine too. If I read an autobiography/biography, and there are photos in it (either scattered through or a clump in the middle), I don't look at them until I get to them! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kylie Posted February 28, 2011 Share Posted February 28, 2011 (edited) I think at least some books don't have the pictures. On a book club show on TV, a woman reviewed some sort of pictorial book that used a really hard-to-read font. She ended up reading the book on an e-reader but turning back to the actual book to see the pictures. I've never been able to resist looking at the pictures first thing when I pick up an auto/biography. Then I look at them again when I actually get to them in the text, and often on one or two random occasions throughout my reading. I guess I'm easily distracted by pretty pictures, and I also have a bad memory! Edited February 28, 2011 by Kylie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Janet Posted February 28, 2011 Share Posted February 28, 2011 It's a sort of OCDish thing with me. When I read Stephen Fry's first part of his autobiography I really wanted to peek but managed not to - it's terribly hard! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted March 1, 2011 Author Share Posted March 1, 2011 Mine too. If I read an autobiography/biography, and there are photos in it (either scattered through or a clump in the middle), I don't look at them until I get to them! I think at least some books don't have the pictures. On a book club show on TV, a woman reviewed some sort of pictorial book that used a really hard-to-read font. She ended up reading the book on an e-reader but turning back to the actual book to see the pictures. I've never been able to resist looking at the pictures first thing when I pick up an auto/biography. Then I look at them again when I actually get to them in the text, and often on one or two random occasions throughout my reading. I guess I'm easily distracted by pretty pictures, and I also have a bad memory! Quite often the pictures are not with the text that is explaining them. I don't mean the captions, but the actual part of the story that goes with it, and like Kylie, I have a bad memory, and have to refer to them fairly consistently. I'll pour over them many times before, during and after. But Janet, I certainly admire your method and stick-to-it-tivness! I couldn't manage. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted March 7, 2011 Author Share Posted March 7, 2011 I've now read two of Laura Lippman's Edgar Award winning detective series starring Tess Monaghan and well worth it they are! The first of the series, Baltimore Blues is a little unusual IMO for a first of a series. It's good. Yes, it has the usual setting up and introducing of running characters, but it's got an excellent detective story as well. I read it on my Kobo, and am considering buying the hard copy. I've acquired a few more of Lippman's books, and intend to collect all of them. Tess is a woman looking for something to do. The newspaper she reported for has been bought out and she is left in the dust as redundant. Collecting unemployment, and rowing are the only two certainties in her life until her practice partner is accused of murder. She turns her reporting skills to another use to help exonerate her partner, and her life is turned upside down. There are a few twists, but this isn't what I'd call a brain buster by any means, but most enjoyable. The Last Place is farther down the list of Lippman's books, and a few years later than the first one, and is more complex and more disturbing. It's an interesting psychological study and Lippman's sense of place is wonderful describing the Baltimore, Maryland area, making the area a character in itself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted March 9, 2011 Author Share Posted March 9, 2011 (edited) The Ghosts of Belfast by Stuart Neville is a little off the beaten path for me, reading wise. Apparently this is Neville's first novel, and has won both the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and The Spinetingler Award and nominated for several others. On top of that it was named one of the best crime books of 2009 by the New York Times. I believe it, all of it. Spinetingler indeed. A fast paced, slightly other worldly story of revenge of a slightly different type. I couldn't stop reading, had to finish, had to know who survived, if anyone in this well written, grab you by the hair and drag you in story. Gerry Fegan was a hard man, spent 12 years of his life in The Maze for his crimes, but some thought that wasn't payment enough for the 12 he'd murdered. A wonderfully realized character study, The Ghosts of Belfast takes the reader into a world that we certainly wouldn't want to inhabit, and makes us look at it, and experience it from every point of view. Oh, there is a sequel.....Collusion. I'm putting it on order. Edited March 9, 2011 by pontalba Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted March 16, 2011 Author Share Posted March 16, 2011 I'd not read any of Neil Gaiman's books before. Now, this month, in a row, I've read Neverwhere and American Gods. I'd rate the former higher than the latter, but only marginally. Both stories of a netherworld that is inhabited by.......what, gods of some sort, some shape or something worse? Gaiman creates fascinating worlds that are true to life, but skewed. They could almost be true. He definitely shows us our world in a different light, and exposes just how much we don't know or understand about it. Fascinating, and highly recommended. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted March 20, 2011 Author Share Posted March 20, 2011 Medicus by Ruth Downie is the first of a series about a Roman doctor, to the XXth Legion, stationed in Britain, circa 120 ish A.D. As a first of the series it contains much set up for the series, and hence drags a bit. The over all story is interesting. It seems a serial killer of sorts is on the loose, killing prostitutes. I found the language to be a bit modern for the setting, and perhaps a bit too casual for my taste. I can rate it 3.5/5, although that may be slightly too high. I did enjoy it enough to at least read one more. Just finished Collusion by Stuart Neville. It's a sequel to the excellent Ghosts of Belfast I read the other week. Fully drawn characters that one would be hard put in some cases to be called completely "good" or "bad". The story pulls the reader along, we have to know what happens to these people. When a policeman of dubious honesty himself questions a lawyer of very dubious morality [hah!] he is given a sort of lecture on collusion and, in a nutshell explains the title of the book. "Collusion," Toner said, his voice dropping to a low, angry hiss. "Everyone talks about collusion, how the cops and the Brits and the Loyalists were in it together. To hear some people talk, you'd think the Loyalists couldn't take a sh** without MI5 or Special Branch wiping their arses for them." Lennon laughed. "Look, I know about the Loyalists. Everybody knows----" "Everybody knows it all, but no one says anything. Look, collusion worked all ways, all directions. Between the Brits and the Loyalists, between the Irish government and the Republicans, between the Republicans and the Brits, between the Loyalists and the Republicans." Toner ran out of breath and his face reddened. He pulled hard on his cigarette and coughed. "All ways, all directions. We'll never know how far it went......" A story about people that cannot, or will not escape their past. Conscience. Love. Hate. Redemption. The future. Highly recommended Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vodkafan Posted March 20, 2011 Share Posted March 20, 2011 I'd not read any of Neil Gaiman's books before. Now, this month, in a row, I've read Neverwhere and American Gods. I'd rate the former higher than the latter, but only marginally. Both stories of a netherworld that is inhabited by.......what, gods of some sort, some shape or something worse? Gaiman creates fascinating worlds that are true to life, but skewed. They could almost be true. He definitely shows us our world in a different light, and exposes just how much we don't know or understand about it. Fascinating, and highly recommended. Ah I knew I shouldn't have clicked on your log pontalba....now I am gonna have to put the Neville books and some Neil Gaiman on my wishlist. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted April 2, 2011 Author Share Posted April 2, 2011 (edited) Ah I knew I shouldn't have clicked on your log pontalba....now I am gonna have to put the Neville books and some Neil Gaiman on my wishlist. My work is done! Seriously, the Neville books are verra well worth reading. I do hope he continues to write, even if not that particular set of characters. Although I am most curious to see how that would pan out. One of my recent reads was What They Fought For 1861-1865 by James M. McPherson. It covers only a narrow path, but an interesting one. Short and sweet, the author showcases private correspondence between American Civil War soldiers and home, and analysis of same. Both sides are represented, and McPherson's analysis of their feelings seems fair and balanced. I thought it an excellent and even handed introduction to that War, and have actually bought more books on the Civil War by him. So often writers take on the subject in such an unbalanced way, completely demonizing the South, condemning everyone down here as racist and worse. Honestly it has made my blood boil to read some comments, so I was at first reluctant to pick up anything on the subject. However my OH, being born in New York has been curious about the Southern view of the War, so we've been investigating. We've found some good stuff. I'll report here as we wend our way through it. Highly Recommended The Memory Chalet by Tony Judt is his last book. Sadly Mr. Judt died shortly after finishing this book, a wonderful tribute and a saying Good-Bye to life in general. It could have been a real tear jerker, and in places tears to come, but it's a marvelous thing to read. The amazing thing is that even in the throes of Lou Gehrig's disease, he was still able to remember these stories in such detail, vignettes of his life, that we, the reader are totally in his world. Judt was a historian that could capture a reader. Highly Recommended. Unknown by Didier Van Cauwelaert is the book that the film with Liam Neeson that recently came out is based on. We went to the movie, and although there were plot flaws [natch], we found it to be a fast paced adventure. The book though seems far more disjointed, and his style of writing is awkward to my eye. I don't know if it is the translation or not, but even the ending was uncertain for me. I could not even tell if the "fatal happening" actually happened at the end or not! Irritating. The plot differed from the movie, different city, different settings. But the basic plot of a man waking up from a coma, going home and his wife denying knowing him, and a man purporting to be him is the same. I like that premise very much, and the resolution of that plot was a good plot twist for me. I can recommend the film for a fast paced, unthinking sort of thrill ride, but skip the book. If however you do read the book, please let me know if they "did it"! Edited April 2, 2011 by pontalba Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted April 18, 2011 Author Share Posted April 18, 2011 I've been on a Louise Penny kick lately, have read all 6 of her books, 4 of them this month. A wonderful Canadian detective/mystery series that has the most heart of a series of this sort I've seen in ages. Wonderful story lines, true and heartfelt characters that are well-developed over the life of the series. Interesting back stories on the characters, and the landscape! Oh, the landscapes of Canada! Penny's descriptions simply take your breath away. Almost makes me want to live there. Almost. I think our winters are cold.......here in the Southland. heh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted June 2, 2011 Author Share Posted June 2, 2011 I've discovered two new detective series the last month, and they couldn't be more different! The first, by Julia Spencer-Fleming begins with In the Bleak of Mid-Winter. An ex-helicopter pilot from the U.S. Army, turned Episcopalian minister leads a congregation in the northern part of New York State, and seems to court trouble all the way. Oh, did I mention this person is a woman? Love it. She dives in where angels fear to tread. I've only read the first of the series, but have finally collected all but the last, so I have 5 in my TBR stack already. As with most first in a series, there are glitches, and as yet unexplained echoes of her past life. But I'm convinced the series is well worth it. The characters are well drawn, and the northern New York area's bleak winter is a character unto itself. The next is the Butcher Boy series by Thomas Perry that chronicles the life of a Mafia hit man [although he is an independent]........but he is trying to quit, and the female Justice Department agent that is tracking him. I discovered them quite by accident as the third in the series came out. Lucky me, I got to read all three in a row. Butcher's Boy, Sleeping Dogs, and The Informant. Fast paced and exciting, and not for the faint hearted. The action, literally never stops, and the characters unfold over the three books beautifully, the first and last being the best IMO. Perry has another series out about a woman that aids "runners", people that for whatever reason have to disappear and can't depend on the Law to help them. I've read one of those as well. Interesting and complicated female protagonist and good action and plot lines. A short story I downloaded on my new Kindle ( ) , Chimes by Charles A. Gramlich is a fast read, with an unexpected twist towards the end, that I didn't see coming. Gramlich is a local [to me] author, and is actually head of a writing group we sometimes participate in. He is consistently excellent. Verra twisty. He has a series out as well that I have downloaded, but nor read yet. He writes action/sci-fi/western and even some horror. He always has an interesting twist to his stories. He deals in the unexpected. Nice guy, terrific author. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted August 14, 2011 Author Share Posted August 14, 2011 As I mentioned on the other thread, I just finished The Stalin Epigram by Robert Littell. This is one that will stay with me a long time. Heartbreaking, and certainly not as rough as it could have been. It is based on the true story of Osip Mandelstam, told by himself, his wife, lover, and a few others close to him. While it is fiction, there is a good deal of dialogue that is factual, based on the papers of his that his wife was able to salvage, and remember. Mandelstam and Pasternak were poets close to Stalin and his regime, but Mandelstam fell afoul and suffered the consequences of same. Highly Recommended. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted November 25, 2011 Author Share Posted November 25, 2011 Hi All. Haven't been around lately, not reading much this month...so far. Heh, well, it's practically the end of the month and haven't finished one yet. Many starts, a couple on going. 1Q84 by Murakami and The Vertigo Years by Philip Blom at present. Both excellent. I suppose I can partially blame NCIS for not reading as much this month, we've been watching the original series on DVD. Good stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted December 13, 2011 Author Share Posted December 13, 2011 (edited) Didn't finish one book in November, started several..... So unusual for me. grrrrr! I've been reading 1Q84, it seems, forever, and am finally 82% done. Now, I only want it to be over. That said, I like the book, on one level at least. Parts of it are disturbing, parts annoying. I just want to shout......get on with it! I know if I start another book, and become interested, I won't get back to 1Q84, and that would be just wrong. Especially at this late date. Edited December 13, 2011 by pontalba Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
julie Posted December 13, 2011 Share Posted December 13, 2011 (edited) Pontalba You sound a bit like me with your current book. Sometimes if I am reading one and close to being done, I might have another laying here that I am anxious to start,so it's hard to keep on task with the first one . I agree, it's best to keep on pushing through with your other one, then you can start a new one . This IQ84 must be quite popular .Is it one about the end of the world, type book or am I mixing it up with another ? I have yet to read one like that,although I have The Passage here which I think is that type of story. I'm not sure why I bought it, other than I fall for any book that says BESTSELLER or AWARD WINNER . I don't even read what it's about, if it won an award, I buy it . Weird,huh ? Edited December 13, 2011 by julie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pontalba Posted December 13, 2011 Author Share Posted December 13, 2011 LOL Prize winning.....that is a difficult one to resist. No, 1Q84 doesn't, at least so far, have apocalyptic overtones. If you are a fan of "end of the world" books, you've got to read Malevil by Robert Merle. One of the best I've ever read, and on my Top Ten for life books. Here is a review I put up last year, when I did a reread. http://www.bookclubforum.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/561-robert-merle-malevil/page__p__7660__hl__malevil__fromsearch__1#entry7660 You'll have to find it used though, through Amazon Marketplace perhaps. It came out in the early '70s. I have read The Passage, and loved it. Slow moving in places, but well worth it, for me at least. I can't wait till the sequel comes out next year! Of course I'll have to reread....... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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