What are you reading right now?

[Zixinus]

I liked it, even if it lacks technical detailed advice. Just don´t let Stark hear you.

I rather know whether its useful.

And I'm afraid to ask, but: why, what is it that Stark despises about this book? Yes, its self-help essentially, but as far as I can tell, its simply advice on people.

[Pick]

Just read The Thief of Always. Or possibly re-read it. I got serious deja vu, and I consumed books like fire when I was a kid, so it strikes me as very likely. However, I had forgotten most of it, so it was worth going back to check it out again. Pretty all right for a kid's book. Definitely not as good as Ptolemy's Gate though.

[Aaron]

I'm working through The Dwarves by Markus Heitz at the moment. It follows a Dwarf raised by humans as he attempts to stop a plot by a dark force to take over the known world. I can't quite decide if it's good or not, I'm only about half-way through it at the moment but I do approve of the way he went with the Dwarves in his universe. Their a little more three dimensional then I'm used to.

[Stark]

Some Solomon Kane stuff. Bear was right; it's pretty funny and fucked up stuff. Not horrible, but I have a soft-spot for pre-DnD fantasy.

[loomer]

The Atlas of Cyberspace at the moment. Pretty light going, but it's some interesting stuff (especially some of the maps showing net traffic.)

[The Yosemite Bear]

and Imagine what would have happened if His mom wasn't such a tight assed fundy and let him and that flapper school teacher get stay together Stark....

Reason why Howard never made it to 30, his mom was a controlling fundy, his Girl Friend Novalyne Price was not, in fact she liked watching boxing, consuming illegal drink, driving in "fast cars", sex and other activities that Ma Howard didn't approve of. A few months after she left Texas for Lousiana because of her boyfriend's mom. The mom slips into a coma, and Howard kills himself.

just think what could have happened if they could have made it....

[Stark]

I'm not aware of how Howard's actual life correlates to the stories he wrote. Was there some influence that pushed him towards the more historical stuff?

Next month Gollancz releases an 800-page hardcover of Howard's non-Conan stuff, so I'm definately snagging that up.

[loomer]

City and Country in the Ancient World , edited by John Rich and Andrew Wallace-Hadrill.

[SCRawl]

I'm slogging through The Superorganism, which is a book about eusocial insects. I don't make much headway with my book reading these days, as I don't have a whole lot of time to devote to it, but this book has one certain virtue: it made The Origin of Species, which I read just before starting this book, seem positively scintillating. (This isn't to say that I didn't like these books, but, you know, they're a little dry.)

[Pick]

Did you just harsh on E. O. Wilson's writing style?

If I knew you, you'd be dead to me .

Frankly, though, him talking about group selection was kind of bothersome for me, since I agree with Dawkins on it being utter bunk. Speaking of Dawkins, his The Ancestor's Tale is a wonderful read and I'd recommend it to anyone, probably above and beyond any of his others.

[The Yosemite Bear]

Did I mention I'm finally getting around to reading the Lindsey Dexter books?

[SCRawl]

Did you just harsh on E. O. Wilson's writing style?

If I knew you, you'd be dead to me .

I said that I found the book a little dry, and it's mostly because I have no background in biology. (I haven't taken a course involving any biology at all since I was about 14 years old.) I'm reading it because it was a gift, and because it came with a recommendation. I said nothing about Dr. Wilson's writing style -- it seems wholly appropriate to the subject matter.

[loomer]

Finished off City and Country at work today, so tonight it's Tears of the Traitor by Ian Irvine. It seems slightly subpar to his last lot (I haven't read the first 4 book set of the View from the Mirror, just the Geomancer quartet and that was pretty fine) but I'm willing to stick with it for this guy.

[Akhlut]

Ciaphas Cain: Hero of the Imperium omnibus by Sandy Mitchell.

I'm hoping to get some more books for my birthday on the 9th and get started on those.

After Ciaphas Cain, I'm probably going start in on some other WH40k omnibuses my cousin lent to me.

[The Grim Squeaker]

Dust of Dreams by Steven Erikson.
Next up is the rest of my UK reading list, "Space Captain Smith" by Toby Frost, "The Photographer's Eye" and then I'll see what next .

[RedImperator]

Just read through The Geography of Nowhere, Home from Nowhere, and The City in Mind, all by James Howard Kunstler. Took me about four days to get through the three books.

[The Yosemite Bear]

healing up from the incision on my bum, so I should go through quite a bit of reading, I went through most of death or Glory in the waiting room, the exam room, during the proceedure on my arse, etc.

[Bob the Gunslinger]

I'm just about to start the new Repairman Jack novel, Ground Zero. After that, I think I might try the Black Company books and The Ancestor's Tale by Dawkins.

[Dendrobius]

Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway by J Parshall and A Tully. It's a really good take on the Battle of Midway and is very well researched from what I can see. The book approaches the battle exclusively from the Japanese point of view, and delves into "Why did the Japanese make x decision instead of y?", which isn't covered nearly as well from Western books.

A lot of mythbusting is also done, correcting common wisdoms such as "If Nagumo hadn't decided to rearm his aircraft with land attack weapons, he'd have been ready to spank the Americans when he found them", and "The torpedo bombers from VT-8 sacrificed themselves for the greater good by pulling Japanese CAP fighters to sea level and thus allow the American dive bombers to attack". By referring to then current IJN doctrine, reconstructed air operations timetables, after action reports and other sources, the authors take apart many of these myths and postulate in their stead more reasonable and likely scenarios, which I found very well done.

The writing style is reasonably relaxed, and I found it to work in the book's favour, making it very enjoyable to read. Highly recommended.

Next on the list, Let the Galaxy Burn, because I like mixing serious reading with popcorn novels

[CaiusWickersham]

I'm about 2/3 of the way through "A Games of Thrones" and enjoying just about every page. I've bought "A Clash of Kings" for when I'm finished. I'm also reading the Berserk manga and I have recently finished the first Black Company omnibus & The Divine Comedy.

[Guardsman Bass]

I finished reading The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown last Friday. Don't read it. Whereas the Da Vinci Code was at least mildly entertaining (even if most of what Brown said about Gnosticism and the Grail was nonsense), this book was repetitive to the point of exasperation, formulaic even by Dan Brown standards, and seriously chock full of pseudoscience.

I also finished The Other Lands by David Anthony Durham, in the Acacia fantasy trilogy. It's not my favorite series; I don't like the characters as much as a I do in other series, and Durham is a bit too fond of exposition in his novels (which results in the narrative voice sounding more like that of a modern historian than the characters at time). It was still a pretty good book, though, and Durham developed the characters better.

I'm stuck on From Colony to Superpower, which is a history of US foreign policy from the Revolutionary War to Modern Times. More precisely, I'm stuck at the period just before World War I - I just can't seem to muster any desire to go on. I think I'll give it another shot pretty soon (since I'll have to take it back to the library anyways), and if I get back into it, I'll renew it.

I saw Terry Brooks' A Princess of Landover on the Fantasy shelf at the library for New Fiction. Bleh - I'm not going to continue.

As part of my class on Labor Economics, I've been reading Jeremy Rifkin's End of Work. It's dated, but still interesting - Rifkin makes a good case for lowering the hours in the work-week again (just like in the past they fell from about 53 in 1900 to 40 hours).

[Rye]

Currently reading Animal Farm, I'm sure that'll be finished tonight, it's only tiny. After that, I'm on to my Lovecraft omnibus.

[ray245]

Currently reading A history of Rome to A.D. 565 sixth Edition by William G. Sinnigen and Arthur E.R. Boak, as well as Stephen Mitchell's A history of the later Roman Empire, AD 286 to 641

[Lusankya]

I'm reading vocab lists at the moment. Lots and lots of vocab lists.

Then I get to read them again and again and again and again and again.

Fun stuff.

[Bounty]

History In Quotations, with foreword by Simon Schama. It's not really a book, but as toilet literature it's perfect.