The Beak of the Finch: A Story of Evolution in Our Time
Jon Weiner

Barack Obama - Dreams from My Father

Let's see!

just starting Neal Stephenson's Anathem. I hope it improves.

without a doubt.

i just re-read this book in a one sitting the other night.

it was a much different read knowing the ending but i liked maybe more.

J. Brown sighting, zomg!

I'm going to buy The Road today at Borders, I think. I'm forcing my dad to read it (he's not a reader) so that we can go see the movie together. My justification to him is, "It's a father-son book!" It's a bit of a stretch calling it that, in terms of a reason for him to read it, but still. I'm pumped for the movie.

I read Oleanna yesterday. I'd seen the movie version already, but reading the play is a trip. It's definitely meant to be heard and seen visually, not seen on the page. It's hard to read the entire play without reading it aloud. I had forgotten how many wonderful ideas are in such a short piece.

Oleanna is about a college professor about to get tenure and a young female student who come to his office with some questions about her confusion and about education. From there, a wonderful dialogue occurs where he tries to "educate her." Both of these characters have an amazing amount of depth consideirng how little we know about them. It's a wonderful cat-and-mouse battle between the two and the tension is pretty amazing. Loved Oleanna (5*/5).


I'll be starting 2009 Illinois Abraham Lincoln Award nominee (best adolescent novel) Crank by Ellen Hopkins. I don't know what to expect, but I've heard good things in general terms.

i think you are the only one who notices and/or cares if i post.
(well maybe katy seagull misses me too, not sure)

i just finished a couple of books that i found interesting.

"Why Kerouac Matters" by John Leland
great book if you appreciate the beat writers.

"American Son" by Oscar De La Hoya
not very well written but i am a huge fight fan so i enjoyed it.

"Everyman" by Philip Roth
this was a re-read and a quick one. (this one i am recommending to you AJ)
i love his writing and this novella is thought provoking.

"In Defense of Food" by Michael Pollan
makes you really think about the things we call food and eat.
his other food book is great too "The Omnivore's Dilemma" in fact i think i liked it better but i loved them both. if you have an interest in health at all they are good.

i have recently been polling a half dozen or so of the people i respect (and who are smarter than me) the latter is not difficult to find and asking them for there all time favorite book. i am then setting off implementing them into my must buy/read list.

up next "The Count of Monte Cristo" a classic that slipped past me.
then "Angle of Repose" by Wallace Stegner.

anyone on here care to add one? must be your all time favorite book.

J. Brown,

I've noted your recommendation by Roth. It's interesting you also mention the beat writers because a few kids in my class were talking about them recently. I'm not really into them, but my exposure has been limited. My impression is that it's just not relaly myt hing.

As for a recommendation, I'll leave that to those more willing to assume they're smarter than you. (That and I don't have one that fits your criteria, as I'm not sure I have an all-time favorite book right now).

And yes, I miss your input in this forum. I always enjoyed it.

I'm looking for a really good mystery book to read. Preferably one where the protagonist is a male (call me sexist or whatever, but i just can't relate to the main character when it's a female) private detective or something close. It can be an older book or something new. Any suggestions?

I would imagine Raymond Chandler books fit this bill. He's considered one of the greater writers of that genre. Check him out. If this was too obvious, then I can't help you, as he's all I knwo about from the genre.

I haven't read Pollan's books, but I've read a number of his essays. I enjoy his writing.

Favorite book? That's always hard to answer. For fiction, I'd go with Joyce's Ulysses. For non-fiction/fiction, I think Walden is the best (I'm never quite sure whether to read it as a novel or as non-fiction). For straight non-fiction, you can't do much better than Edward Abbey's Desert Solitaire although I love so many books in this area, especially the works of Annie Dillard and Barry Lopez, it's hard to pick one. Poetry, go with Wallace Stevens. For essays, my favorite form of literature, I love so many writers it's almost impossible to pick one, but Montaigne is essential. Perhaps you can't go wrong with Philip Lopate's anthology:The Art of the Personal Essay, which is very comprehensive.

http://www.amazon.com/Art-Personal-E.../dp/038542339X

You have to go a long way to beat Sherlock Holmes

Solo, I know; many people hate postmodern fiction, but I love it for some reason. Barth's story, though, provides the recipe for how to write a story at the same time as the narrator is telling the story, which may or may not be a very good story of adolescent initiation. Who's in charge of the funhouse? I like the way he equates the funhouse operator with the author.

Now, try a few of the short stories (or whatever they are) in Gilbert Sorrentino's Little Casino if your library has it.

BTW, I read Lost in the Funhouse and Barth's The Floating Opera as a freshman in college--for a sociology class! I was slightly confused.

Chandler's great line: "He looked as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food." Have read four of his novels; they're terrific.

And searching for the exact quote, I came across this gem from Mark Twain:

"He was a solemn, unsmiling, sanctimonious old iceberg who looked like he was waiting for a vacancy in the Trinity."

Thanks for the recommendation. I'll check Chandler out.

Yeah, it's definitely a confusing venture for me, trying to read postmodern lit. I feel like it's odd I don't like it, because I usually like philosophical stuff and most of the postmodern lit I've come across certainly falls into that category. I don't know what it is.

I'll try to get my hands on Sorrrentino for a comparison or whatever may come from reading it.

Oh, and I think you had an awfully ambitious Sociology teacher freshman year. That seems like a really weird choice for that class and for freshman. Maybe they've just been dumbed down though in the last few years (college courses).

Just finished Pulitzer Prize Finalist:
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

Some truly epic pages in this book..Genius writer, and a great story on the beauty of life..Really highly reccommended.

i second this. i really loved this book. use to recommend it all the time.

I just read "The Kite Runner,"

easy read, but also very moving and well written. It made me cry, but a lot of books do (strangely almost no movies ever have). It was fascinating to see how people on the other side of the world live, there was so much I didn't know. And still don't I'm sure.

I normally don't follow this thread and so don't know if it's been discussed here, but L.A. Confidential (by James Ellroy) was outstanding. The movie was good; the book was better. And yes, the protagonist(s) is (are) male.

Ellroy's writing style takes getting used to, bu LA Confidential is pretty fantastic.

I just tried reading some Shaw. I have been looking forward to reading him and he is terrible. Okay, fine, if anyone has anything that is really good, I will give him a second chance.

George Bernard Shaw is terrible?

George Bernard Shaw?

His plays are pretty good. I never read his books or short stories.

That reminds me. I once read a play, written in the Victorian era or more likely turn of the 19th-20th century, that I thought was by Shaw but apparently isn't, that centres on Napoleon. I think most of it is a dialogue between Napoleon and another man, and I do remember one monologue by Napoleon where he reflects on why he has trouble beating the English.


It goes something like (and bear with me, I haven't read it for 25+ years):

"Europe I can control. They are just mobs, and I can control the mob with cannon. But the English confound me. They refuse to be a mob."


I think it had the word 'Man' in the title.


Help me, Lounge?

Read his introductions to his plays; they're part of the experience.