Finished The Godfather. Excellent book, for any of those who enjoyed the movie, I highly recommend the book. I really loved how much more description and history was given to many of the characters (ie. Luca Brasi).

Currently reading City of God. I absolutely loved the movie (and HIGHLY recommend the movie to any of those who haven't seen it). It takes place in Rio de Janeiro in the slums where the city is run by kid gangs (ages 10-18). absolutely fascinating.

I like how you're pimping a movie in the book thread....as I sort of did, too, I guess.

I haven't seen City of God. I don't know anything about it but from all the raving recommendations I assume it should be moved to the top of my Netflix list...now....will I do it?

Don't miss that movie, it is excellent.

About books, I am reading Quicksilver, but now the second book on my shelf is "Vernon God Little" by DBC Pierre. One of my profs knowing that I was from the Mexico-Texas border recommended this book which got the Booker Prize (and he lent me the book).

I just finished reading Abandon the Old in Tokyo and The Pushcart Man and Other stories, a couple collections of graphic pieces.

I didn't find every story perfect, but I liked very much the overall feel of the stories. Almost all are about some everyman at the bottom tier of Japanese society soon after WW2. Often he's either single and lonely and feels disassociated from society or, if attached, is already or incipiently a cuckold or else someone whose wife or girl works in the sex trade to make ends meet. Sometimes his partner feels empowered and in control of her life by virtue of that job in a way he doesn't in his own job and life, and puts him down. Yet sometimes his anxiety can't quite be pinned down.

And in many stories the character will do something odd, unexpected, even crippling to try to gain some sense of place in the universe or get something from people that he wants but doesn't feel they are providing; sometimes it's not really clear what it is, or if anything could make him feel happy or at home in a world that can seem obtuse, characterless, or even grotesque. Sometimes it appears people are trying to be human, loving, and give him what he wants, perhaps harder than he himself is trying, but it doesn't get through to him. Something in him just can't seem to find its feet and doesn't really know what to do about it or how to articulate it fully even to himself. The variations of how some of these feelings are played out in the two collections of stories eventually became for me kind of a fugue and flowed together more poetically the more stories I read, gathering power.

I'll buy the next collections when they come out. The books are nice hardbacks very reasonably priced at Amazon by the way.

The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman. The third book in his 'God-hating' His Dark Materials series. Read 280 pages yesterday while proctoring an exam, so far so good (but a little slow).

Well, I just finished Orson Scott Card's Empire. It was on par with David Baldacci's novels that I really enjoy, the ones with Michelle Maxwell and Sean King. It isn't the greatest of its genre, but it's a pretty fun one. The negative reviews on Amazon mostly say that it was "too political" or not like Ender's Game. Oh really? I say to the latter, no kidding.

It is a little political at times, I suppose. However, I'm ignorant enough regarding politics that I actually just enjoyed the ride it took me on. Maybe it is implausible, but I didn't notice and I frankly wasn't reading the book for its plausibility anyway.

I recommend it for a quick read if you're looking to see how politics could spurn a new American civil war. There's some goofy technology weapons that seem right up Card's alley.

Overall, the characters seemed real enough and honorable enough for me to care. While it would probably be a popcorn flick flop, I would love to see Empire turned into a movie.

trying to finish "The Quest" by Wilbur Smith, its the 3rd book out of 4 in a series about ancient egypt, quite entertaining...

gonna start "Faust", "Blind Watchmaker", or "God Delusion" next...i haven't decided which one...

I have started Eats, Shoots & Leaves by Lynne Truss. It's already been worth reading because I found out that the Brits call a period a full stop. I don't know if I'll be able to finish this before I head home for winter break from school, but it's going to be a nice quick read I think, either way. That is a good thing.

i just started lord of the flies

I just started "Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany."

I read the piece that started off this book in The New Yorker a few years ago and really loved it. A writer/editor for The New Yorker commits himself to being an unpaid kitchen grunt to Mario Batali to see what the chef like is like. In his 40's already, he doesn't really have the stamina and is able to supplement that with a near total lack of knowledge and technique as well. But he brings a game spirit, and it's fun to see what he goes through and learns from the very old-school, raw pork fat eating hero-chef Batali is. The book got great reviews, so I'm figuring I'll enjoy the rest of the story.

i recently listened to this as an audiobook (although it may have been abridged) and enjoyed it

Pokerwise, I am flipping through the Full Tilt book (which I got today) while non-pokerwise, I am working on Double Cross by James Patterson.

Doc T, I would be interested in your thoughts (non-spoiler) on Double Cross. I realize that the review might just be "It's typical Patterson," but even that would be nice.

Well, I am only about fourteen chapters in so far. As is usual with Patterson's Cross novels, it is an easy, but engaging read.

When I finish, I will post more.

Thanks although that alone is enough to make it interesting. I have only read like two Cross novels, but I really would like to get around to reading the rest I own.

I just finished Eats, Shoots & Leaves and aside from the strange British terminology that was unfamiliar and hilarious (a dog's ****, lol), the rest of it is both informative and mildly entertaining. I don't know how dumbed down the children's version is, but I could easily see a hybrid between the two as a must read book for freshman in my future high school class or something.

I gave it ****/5. Amazon's "I like it." (Or across the pond, "I like it".)

I'm going to be starting one of the following books tonight or tomorrow. Any recommendations could swing which I choose.

Confederacy of Dunces
The Annotated H.P. Lovecraft
A Sound of Thunder

Ive read Confederacy of Dunces. Its a very funny book and the protagonist is hilarious. i don't quite recall all the details but remember it being funny and a pretty quick read.

orange, that was my lean anyway. I'm glad to hear that you enjoyed it. I have owned it for well over a year and my step-mother read it and said that she really didn't 'get it.' I guess it made too many references she didn't understand and she didn't find the humor in the story.

I have no idea why at the moment. However, I'm hoping after reading it I can explain it to her or something. Haha.

AJ I would go with Confederacy of Dunces, it's a pretty awesome book.

I'll be reading Coming Up For Air by George Orwell tonite.

IMO, it is absolutely worth it. I loved Gravity's Rainbow and I will probably pick up V. within the next year. Also, it is not as hard to get through as you may have been led to believe if you accept up front that you simply won't understand everything.

I disliked The Crying of Lot 49 quite a bit.

I'm enjoying "Heat" quite a bit. An light, chummy read.

Reading Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy. About halfway through, and I have decided to read everything McCarthy has ever written.

i'm curious why you disliked it

does the author ever use quotation marks in that book? i flipped through no country and the road and didn't see any during the dialog.

I found it not very readable while straining arduously to be profound in a way that it wasn't. I got the feeling of a writer deeply in love with his writing more than one who cared if he had much to give. I felt his love for himself won out over his love for his readers or his story.