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Finished Farley Mowat's Never Cry Wolf. I laughed out loud a few times and found it informative without being academic. A very fast read that a regular reader could knock off in an afternoon.

Sorry I don't have more to say but just as I started writing this work took a crap on my desk that made thinking of Mowat's book difficult. It's good. I recommend it.
 
I finished La Reina del Sur (The Queen of the South) by Arturo Pérez-Reverte last night. I enjoyed this book immensely. At first I was a little confused by the mexican slang some of the characters use but I soon got the hang of it. So far I have read 3 of Pérez-Reverte's novels and I have liked them all, although I have to say that my favorite is El Club Dumas (maybe that's because I have always loved The 3 Musketeers). I would like to read some of his non fiction work.
 
After The Flood - P.C. Jersild

It took me some time to get involved with it - it's relentlessly bleak and desolate. Early on, I really wanted to put it down (and in fact, started a thread about how you know when it's time to put a book down) but I stuck with it until I finished it, yesterday. Now I've started a new book, but I can't get out of the feel of the old one. You know how that happens? You live with a character, in a certain setting, for a period of time, and then it's kind of a shock to be living with a totally different character in a totally different setting. My being was so imbued with the caracter of the last book. I feel kind of homesick. I guess that means it was a pretty great book. I would not recommed it to the faint hearted, or those that demand that anything good at all happens in a book. It will stay with you, though.
If anyone has read this, I'd be happy to talk to you about it.
 
I finished The Wizards And The warriors last week, then i read Lyra's Oxford (it took me about ten mins) and now i am reading The Magicians Guild.
 
Just finished Iacocca's autobiography. He was a die-hard Ford man who helped to create the Mustang. Interestingly enough, people within Ford didn't want the car and after sitting in it, Henry Ford II demanded that another inch be added to the chassis due to him being slightly uncomfortable in it. Ford II comes off as being a milder version of Howard Hughes. Profligate spending, a divorce, and alcoholism are mentioned as a few of his faults. Iacocca more than spills the beans on Henry Ford II. You can't read it and not leave wondering if the Ford family is a hotbed of neurosis. Employees fired not based on performance, but due to not being liked by the boss, the spending of money that would make most wealthy people blush, as well as Iacocca's ouster at Ford are all re-created in detail.

I have truly learned a lot in reading this book. Chrysler was the first to invent the oil filter, air filter, electronic ignition, and in providing "under the hood" computers. Iacocca gives you a glimpse into how the auto industry is run. When he took over Chrysler, it was truly in shambles. One humorous point was that the president of the company had to put up with people using his office as the shortest point between two other rooms. He would be on the phone and some employee would just barge on in heading to another room. In reading it, you also come away with viewing this man as a visionary. He came up with the designs for the first mini-van(only to have Ford II shoot 'em down) that eventually helped to resurrect Chrysler. Not only that, but he was the first to think of mergers with foreign auto companies(i.e.-Daimler Chrysler) and the use of foreign engines in domestic vehicles(Ford II said "no"- now it's widely practiced.)

I can't drive by a Ford dealership now and not have a smirk from remembering an amusing passage. Our next car will definitely be a Dodge, Plymouth, or Chrysler. This is a good book-I can see why it was immensely popular in the 80s.
 
just finished reading straight by dick francis. like his books even if i have no idea of the things and places that he talks about, specially horses and jockeys; but he's a good storyteller and i enjoy reading his books.
 
I’m new here, so I’ll just post some of the better books I’ve read in the last month or so:

Red Leaves by Thomas H. Cook: A young girl disappears and the sullen, loner 17-year old boy who had been babysitting her prior in the evening becomes the main suspect. The story is told from the point of view of the teenager’s father, who suddenly suspects he knows little about the members of his own family. This book was very good but would have been great had it not been for the intense foreshadowing that was as subtle as a sledgehammer. I hate it when authors do that. I must give extra praise for the cover though, which is one of the most beautiful I’ve ever seen.

The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly: I was apprehensive about reading this book, as I don’t normally enjoy legal procedurals. (The only exception has been David Rosenfelt’s books, which I love.) Although the main character of Michael Haller isn’t a very sympathetic character in the beginning, this book turned out to be exceptional. Connelly keeps throwing out one hook after another until you’re thoroughly engrossed in the story and the characters, and you can’t turn the pages fast enough.

The Book of Joe by Jonathan Tropper: This book is about Joe Goffman, who left sleepy Bush Falls, Connecticut after high school and never looked back. Then he wrote a novel savaging everything in town, a novel that became a national bestseller and a huge hit movie. Fifteen years later, Joe’s father has a stroke, so it's back to Bush Falls for the town's most famous pariah. This book turned out to be more of a drama than the comedy I expected, but I enjoyed it a lot anyway and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it.

Peace Like a River by Leif Enger: This book was simply wonderful. The writing was just beautiful, and the characters engaging. One of the better books I've read this year.

Me & Emma by Elizabeth Flock: It's about two very different sisters, one eight and one six, who live with an extremely abusive stepfather and an uncaring mother. A heartbreaking book, simply written, with a surprising twist at the end that I didn’t foresee.

Also, in the last month, I attended my very first author book signing! A local independent bookseller hosted crime fiction author Jack Kerley, who talked about his latest book The Death Collectors. The plot involves serial killer memorabilia, and Kerley talked about how, why and by whom it is collected. As you can imagine, it was a fascinating discussion that I enjoyed immensely. If you enjoy crime fiction, be sure to check out this author.
 
I finished Magician's Guild last night, it was a great book now I am going to read Darkwalker on Moonshae by Douglas Niles while I save up £7 to buy Novice
 
SFG75, I remember Iacocca saying something in Road & Track magazine years ago comparing Chrysler's new, at that time, Viper to the Porsche 959. I have to paraphrase it because I don't remember it exactly but it was something like this:

When creating the Viper we didn't want to just throw raw HP at the car(like Porsche did with the 959), we wanted it to be a marvel of technology.
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Anyone with an ounce of knowledge of both cars knows how assanine a statement that is. The 959 is still a technological marvel that even today's production Viper can't touch. The Viper is still an 8L, or possibly more, rear drive rattle trap. The man was a moron. Anyone who slights Porsche is. ;) While he did great things for Chrysler they were in pretty poor shape not long after he left with all their cars being way over modulated. The New Yorker was nothing more than a K car with leather seats at one point. He sold a lot of cars but I'm not sure he was ever good for cars.
 
I have just finished reading Italo Calvino's "If on a Winter's Night a Traveler..." and have concluded that I am the wrong person to write an appreciation of it. It is an early example of (very) non-linear fiction that literature majors will describe as hypermodern and writerly. It is not a conventional novel because it doesn't really have a continuous story line. And the dozen independent and unrelated stories that it contains are not really short stories either because they have no endings. They are each, in fact, interrupted at their climax and are therefore best described as incomplete storylets. So I think it is fair to say that a non-novel of unconnected incomplete storylets is rather different than anything I have ever read, or even known about. Nevertheless some of the storylets are are absolutely hilarious, others are interesting, and still others are very low key. In between the storylets, the author discusses with great insight many aspects of writing and reading, and seemingly all things in between. He is not a man of few words. So it is a highly unusual book. And it is a tribute to Calvino's writing skill that he is able to entice a general reader along such an unlikely path, parts of which I found very slow and verging on very boring.

If you look at amazon you will see many appropriately glowing reviews, which will tell you more about the book. And if you look at wikipedia you will find a well organized description of its contents. I would strongly suggest doing both of those things before thinking of buying the book or starting to read it. In one sense I am glad to be done with it; in another sense I am glad I have read it. You will have to make your own decision. (But bear in mind that I have considerable tolerance for slow and tedious books.) And if these comments appear disjointed and inconclusive to you then perhaps they are vaguely like the book.
Peder
 
I just finished Tathea by Anne Perry. The only reason I kept reading was to see how far into LDS theology she was going to go. It just wasn't that great a story, but I was curious. I even went to Anne Perry's website to see if there was any mention of her being a Morman. There wasn't, but it seems like I read somewhere that she was an LDS church member. I don't mind an author promoting their beliefs, but the story was just wierd in places. After looking it up on Amazon, I found several reviewers who didn't like this book.
 
OOPS: post-modern

I should have said post-modern not hyper-modern in the discussion of Calvino's novel up above there by a couple posts.
Peder
 
Just finished "The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World" by A. J. Jacobs. I highly recommend this - it's funny, informative, and inspiring all at the same time!
 
I have just finished Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. This novel was one of the best novels that I have read this year. Make that ever. Definately a novel that lives up to its hype and deserves its place as one of the best sci-fi/fantasy novel of all time.

I really liked the build-up of anticipation regarding what happened to turn the earth into such a desolate place. She manages to keep the secret until right at the end without losing the reader's interest, as the rest of the novel is compelling and extremely interesting, even though some things don't make sense until further information is revealed throughout the book.

The thing that made this book a winner for me, however, were all the GE experiments/inventions. The novel is filled with highly imaginitive creatures, plants and technology, which always kept me entertained with their original and extremely entertaining features and behaviours. I found the in-depth description of these creations to be very interesting, especially the detail about the Crakers.

A definate must-read - this really places Atwood among the best writers living today, IMHO.
 
The Way The Crow Flies by Ann-Marie MacDonald- A very good novel with multiple plots besides the main murder which the book is centered around. I truly enjoyed how all of the different sub stories spun around the murder. I also did some research about the real life case this book was inspired by, and that made it all the more interesting. An enjoyable read that is a well told story.

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S Lewis: This has turned out to be my favorite of the Narnia series. I even like it better than the Lion, the witch and the wardrobe. This story definitely has the most imaginative adventure with so many different settings. I really loved how this book is filled entirely with fantasy as the children travel to different worlds.
 
I have just finished The Long Rifle by Stewart Edward White, a book that was published in 1930. It is a book that takes place in the early 1800's, specifically somewhere around 1820 and is a saga of the early mountain men in the western U.S.. The writing and story is pretty wonderful. I recommend this book, without reservation, to anyone interested in that era of the history of the U.S. A little snippet from the book:

Andy had slept the sound sleep of one nervously drained dry. He had not known when the noise had died down. Now he lay on his back in the lodge, staring up at the white wood smoke eddying fantastically across a bar of sunlight. From the branches of the big cottonwood just outside came the soft contemplative crooning of mourning doves. Over beyond, a pony nickered sharply. Clear voiced meadow larks experimented with new songs. Beneath the accents of sound the river gabbled in a hurried and confidential undertone. In contrast to the red-hot murky pandemonium of the night before, this was full of peace, and Andy soaked it up as his bodily tissues soaked up the first water after a desert "scrape".


P.S.....As I sit here by my computer I look out the window and there are 6 deer grazing, actually eating our flowers, in our front yard. :)
 
muggle said:
I have just finished The Long Rifle by Stewart Edward White, a book that was published in 1930. It is a book that takes place in the early 1800's, specifically somewhere around 1820 and is a saga of the early mountain men in the western U.S.. The writing and story is pretty wonderful. I recommend this book, without reservation, to anyone interested in that era of the history of the U.S. A little snippet from the book:

Andy had slept the sound sleep of one nervously drained dry. He had not known when the noise had died down. Now he lay on his back in the lodge, staring up at the white wood smoke eddying fantastically across a bar of sunlight. From the branches of the big cottonwood just outside came the soft contemplative crooning of mourning doves. Over beyond, a pony nickered sharply. Clear voiced meadow larks experimented with new songs. Beneath the accents of sound the river gabbled in a hurried and confidential undertone. In contrast to the red-hot murky pandemonium of the night before, this was full of peace, and Andy soaked it up as his bodily tissues soaked up the first water after a desert "scrape".


P.S.....As I sit here by my computer I look out the window and there are 6 deer grazing, actually eating our flowers, in our front yard. :)
Click to expand...


Just think, if you were out west, you could have the same deer eating flowers in your yard, with a mountain lion stalking them! Where's Marlon Perkins when we need him:D

I have to second the reccomendation of The Long Rifle. It is beautifully written and a great picture of a unique period of American history.
 
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