https://medium.com/@penguinrandomus/...d-14834632fc61

Deliverance by James Dickey is about what I expected: suburban commandos get more than they bargained for from the Georgia wilderness. Solid story but nothing exceptional, and I think Dickey sometimes lingers too long on points worth glossing over (and vice versa).

And the information Mary Roach collects in Packing for Mars has all been told better elsewhere, but not with her particular brand of cutesy, saucy wit. It's nothing new if you know much about space travel, but it's a good collection of the basics. Roach also focuses more on past technologies and solutions than what it will actually take to live on Mars, what future inventions may need to be conceived due to particular Martian circumstances. In fact, she says little about the Red Planet at all. Mostly she explores how the human mind and body reacts to space flight. A good book for beginners, but not much more.

1Q84 was a trip, quite a ride. Probably my favorite book of his so far, edging out Kafka on the Shore. I'm starting The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle tonight.

I don't get how you're doing this. I enjoy his stuff but I'm spent after one book... takes me a few months to attempt another one of his.

I was really grinding to get thru Hardboiled Wonderland, I will admit. Came awful close to quitting on that several times.

Finished re-reading Rum Punch, the basis for the movie "Jackie Brown," by Elmore Leonard.

Still reading Anna Karenina. I finished Part One, there are eight parts, and I'm about 15% through the novel.

I haven't even gotten to Hill House yet, that is next on my list. I finished We Have Always Lived in the Castle and Hangsaman and I'm just blown away by how good they were.

I liked IQ84, but it seemed to kinda stray at the end. I loved every bit of Wind-up Bird, though.

And We Have Always Lived in the Castle is great, better than Hill House, imo.

Started reading Black Betty by Walter Mosley.

I agree about 1Q84, and I'm on track to agree about Wind-Up, about halfway done already. This is really a joy, except it reminds me a lot of that time my marriage fell apart!

Finally picked up some Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene. I don't particularly like the language he uses in the book, constantly making genes seem like actors. And even though he clarifies several times, I would've much preferred a passive voice so as not to confuse the issue. (Yes, it's a pet peeve.) Likewise with terms like "altruistic" which mean one thing to most of us and another to Dawkins himself. Little confusing is all. Other than those couple of complaints (and maybe a couple others) the book is excellent. I'm not completely sold on his kinship dynamics, how he basically tries to divide "caring" for kin into fractional units depending on closeness of relations, but it's still damned interesting and he uses it to demonstrate many cool animal interactions. I loved the section on Environmentally Stable Systems (ESS) as it crystalized a concept I've often thought about but never had a name for.

The final chapter on memes basically created the science of memetics.

Finished reading kafka on the shore, second murakami's novel, after Norwegian wood. It was interesting to read however not everything was tied together at the end which I had expected.

Planning to read wind up chronicle. Can someone tell if these two novels are similar or entirely different. I can see a vague similarity in the description. It could be that these two are only set up at different places or location. Any comments please.

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Definitely a great section. I didn't know that.

Oh, and for the record, the audiobook is dog**** -- it's like Dawkins said, "**** it I'm not doing any more retakes," so they got somebody else to do them.


As for Wind-up... I haven't read Kafka on the Shore, but I have read Norwegian Wood, and Wind-up is way more reliant on the surreal. NW is a pretty simple coming of age story, while Wind-up is more of a middle-aged man dealing with loneliness.

Started Black and Blue by Ian Rankin. I've read a few other novels in the Inspector Rebus series and liked the stories and the writing.

It's his most celebrated book, but The Blind Watchmaker gives a much better description of the process of evolution and answers doubts that people may have such as "How could something as complex as the eye be the result only of evolution?".

These are great, fwiw.

Trying Crime and Punishment again.
Almost halfway but it's so hard to read through all these deliriums and rants from pretty much every character in the book. I don't want to judge the book before I finish it, but I don't really understand why it's so highly rated. Maybe I just don't understand 'literature'.

Sounds like you've been sentenced to some difficult reading. Not every great book is gonna connect with you, that's just life. I remember making it thru Crime and Punishment for a Russian History class back in 1985, just barely. I also had to read Turgenev's Fathers and Sons for the same class, that was a breeze!

Can someone please suggest a basic book on trading which introduces well to the concepts and the complexities involved.

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The Business, Finance, and Investing forum is the place to ask this - check the stickies first.

Just Finished Misery by Stephen King, read it years ago still as terrifying and makes the film seem like a Sunday afternoon family movie

Currently about 1/3 of the way through Interview with a Vampire loving it so far.

I just gave up. Made it halfway and then just skipped to the end. Last the last page and then the epilog part.

Was pretty disappointed by this after the high ratings/reviews it gets.
Perhaps it's partially because it's a translation, but I just couldn't take his mental diarrhea of justifying/feeling bad/guilt/etc anymore.

Overal I feel like he didn't have enough cause to do what he did and that's a bit weak if he really was as introspective as we're suppose to assume.

Finished Bram Stoker's Dracula. I wouldn't say it's the horror blueprint or anything, but it's definitely OG. Mina Harker is a fantastic character. I'm more than a little impressed at how well the action flows despite the epistolary narrative.

I'm not a fan of horror films etc but I enjoyed Dracula when I read it. I also really enjoyed Frankenstein when I read it many years ago.