Stephen King - Misery

Just finished White Noise (DeLillo). I really enjoyed it. Wouldn't recommend it to everyone. To be honest, I don't know how this got on many "best of" list. It's hard to bad mouth because it was very perceptive and fun at times, but I could think of many books I would consider superior.

Very glad I read it, though. It's hard to criticize something that was so good yet imperfect.

I decided I'm going to reread The Quincunx by Charles Palliser. I always name it as one of my favorite books, and everyone I have recommended it to has loved it, but I haven't read it in about sixteen years.

I am reading Roland Lazenby's Jerry West: The Life and Legend of a Basketball Icon .

This is a great story, a poor kid from West Virginia who grows up to be a rich famous basketball legend. Lazenby has clearly worked very hard on this; there are innumerable quotes from West, West's family and friends, and old published sources. And he knows this story in his bones because he's from that area of the country. My parents come from a similar background, and I identify strongly with this story because of that.

I find his prose a little clumsy, better than the average sports biography but not top notch by any stretch. Lazenby is no David Halberstam. But this book has completely won me over at this point, and I can't wait to finish it. It's a very good book that I'd recommend to anyone who likes sports biographies.

Loved it, but hated not being able to figure it out.

Boy, not my favorite. I started it and gave up after about 65 pp. of unremitting pain, much of it caused by the characters' own foolishness.

I know people like it, so maybe it gets rewarding if you keep plugging, but ...

I'm wondering if anyone reads The Alexandria Quartet anymore. If you haven't, try the first in the series, Justine, and decide if you want to read more.

Its been some time since I read this book, but I don't remember getting this impression. More importantly, isn't the main character somewhere in the 5-7 year old range at the beginning of the story? What were some things he did that struck you as particularly foolish for a child of that age?

20 percent (kindle) through brave new world...and I am not digging it. Is it possible that everything in this book became so cliched since the 30s that I cannot enjoy it in present times?

it doesn't age well, I agree

what are y'all'ses favorite comedy books?

Ball Four if you like baseball.
Hitchhikers Guide if not.

lol...Hi TTI. What was that for?

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is one of the few that consistently keeps me laughing out loud.

do you guys have favorable opinions of the books that follow hitchhiker in that series?

they're worth reading but each book is worse than the previous one.

Imo all worth reading but less-so as you go.

/edit lol slow pony

Two books I have read recently.

Earth Abides-George R Stewart
Originally published in 1949,This is a Post apocalyptic book.I really found it enjoyable it did not just paint a rosy happy ending like many books.

I Am Number Four-Pittacus Lore

This is a Science Fiction book that is coming out as a Movie in February.
This is really a young adult volume,What struck me was the similarities to
the Superman story.It is about some young aliens with incredible powers
who are sent to Earth for safety.I do not want to put too many spoilers
but I liked it nice smooth read.

I've started Machine of Death: a collection of stories about people who know how they will die. It is a collection of 30 or so stories by different authors...the premise of each one being that there exists a Machine of Death...which tells you how you will die.

It is a pretty fun read.

Finished Among The Thugs. Started off tremendously, but the 2nd half was painful at times. The author should have just stuck to his stories and first hand accounts. I found his theorizing on crowd behavior to be incredibly boring. Then he starts in on tangential stories that had little to do with soccer. Still glad I read it, but overall it could have been so much better. As often happens with non-fiction, the author feels the need to fill it with personal anecdotal theorizing hogwash, instead of letting the story speak for itself.

Just picked up Straight Man from the library. Still on deck: "the rest" of Underworld, Gravity's Rainbow, another 1000+ pages of Infinite Jest, and Shantaram.

A Clash of Kings done, started A Storm of Swords. Its going to be a huge buzzkill when I get done with A Feast for Crows, isn't it?

well, he's supposed to be close to releasing the fifth book...and the series starts on HBO in April.

I'm just about done rereading all four books...so multi-layered and complicated.

Catch 22.

Hasn't this been true for, like, a couple years now?

I am very much looking forward to the HBO show.

Would you recommend the Song of Ice and Fire series to people who generally do not like fantasy?

Yes...it's less fantasy and more historical, medieval stuff - but in a fictional land. The "fantasy" elements are a small but integral to the story.