What are you reading tonight?

Dr Hotdog · Post by **Dr Hotdog** » Thu Jan 28, 2010 11:52 am

Having never seen the film yet heard so much about the torture scene I thought it best I read Marathon Man before I watched the film adaptation.

This is one of the few occasions when I have read the book before watching the movie, the other really big one that immediately springs to mind if Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (despite it being Gilliam I didn't like it, thinking the book was far better).

Marathon Man was superb. A cracking thriller and incredibly written.
I hope I don't hate the film because Dustin is great and I hear Laurence Olivier is brilliant in it. I can't wait to watch it!

Worthy4England · Post by **Worthy4England** » Thu Jan 28, 2010 9:45 pm

Just about to start a random pick-up book. The Doomsday Key by James Rollins. Dunno if it'll be any good.

William the White · Post by **William the White** » Thu Jan 28, 2010 10:17 pm

Dr Hotdog wrote:Having never seen the film yet heard so much about the torture scene I thought it best I read Marathon Man before I watched the film adaptation.

This is one of the few occasions when I have read the book before watching the movie, the other really big one that immediately springs to mind if Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (despite it being Gilliam I didn't like it, thinking the book was far better).

Marathon Man was superb. A cracking thriller and incredibly written.
I hope I don't hate the film because Dustin is great and I hear Laurence Olivier is brilliant in it. I can't wait to watch it!

Film fantastic, i thought...

William the White · Post by **William the White** » Thu Jan 28, 2010 10:18 pm

boltonaremysecondteam wrote:Off to have a bath soon and will be relaxing in it reading a book from the no 1 ladies detective agency. Really enjoy these books - a branch out from my usual chick lit

Yep - good to read in the bath. I sort of like. Gentle. Shruggable.

thebish · Post by **thebish** » Fri Jan 29, 2010 12:52 pm

Worthy4England wrote:Just about to start a random pick-up book. The Doomsday Key by James Rollins. Dunno if it'll be any good.

how does that work - do you go into the library blindfolded?

thebish · Post by **thebish** » Fri Jan 29, 2010 12:54 pm

William the White wrote:
boltonaremysecondteam wrote:Off to have a bath soon and will be relaxing in it reading a book from the no 1 ladies detective agency. Really enjoy these books - a branch out from my usual chick lit
Yep - good to read in the bath. I sort of like. Gentle. Shruggable.

they ARE chick-lit!! after a while they all kinda merge into one - but are pleasant warm-bath kind of experience. the TV series though - gloriously scenicly shot - but i never lasted more than 20mins before nodding off... (mind you - pretty much anything on sunday eve has that effect!)

Worthy4England · Post by **Worthy4England** » Fri Jan 29, 2010 12:59 pm

thebish wrote:
Worthy4England wrote:Just about to start a random pick-up book. The Doomsday Key by James Rollins. Dunno if it'll be any good.
how does that work - do you go into the library blindfolded?

No, wombling past books in Asda with the missus last night. I usually go with recommendations if I can and I'm trying a new author, but this one, never heard of the author nor the book. I'm such an impetuous fool.

TANGODANCER · Post by **TANGODANCER** » Fri Jan 29, 2010 1:31 pm

Halfway through The Marian Conspircacy by Graham Phillips. Another staggering "revelation" that the Virgin Mary was actually a Judean princess, and Jesus was King Herod's grandson. Ignoring the might-haves and maybe's, the historical background stuff, substantiated by historians and biblical scholars is quite interesting.

Gooner Girl · Post by **Gooner Girl** » Fri Jan 29, 2010 6:41 pm

thebish wrote:
William the White wrote:
boltonaremysecondteam wrote:Off to have a bath soon and will be relaxing in it reading a book from the no 1 ladies detective agency. Really enjoy these books - a branch out from my usual chick lit
Yep - good to read in the bath. I sort of like. Gentle. Shruggable.
they ARE chick-lit!! after a while they all kinda merge into one - but are pleasant warm-bath kind of experience. the TV series though - gloriously scenicly shot - but i never lasted more than 20mins before nodding off... (mind you - pretty much anything on sunday eve has that effect!)

Different to my usual chick lit anyway. I'd really like to see the TV series - do you know if it ever came out on DVD?

Wouldn't expect someone as old as you to stay awake very long on a sunday evening Bish. Nows wheres your zimmer and ear trumpet?

thebish · Post by **thebish** » Fri Jan 29, 2010 6:51 pm

Worthy4England wrote:
thebish wrote:
Worthy4England wrote:Just about to start a random pick-up book. The Doomsday Key by James Rollins. Dunno if it'll be any good.
how does that work - do you go into the library blindfolded?
No, wombling past books in Asda with the missus last night. I usually go with recommendations if I can and I'm trying a new author, but this one, never heard of the author nor the book. I'm such an impetuous fool.

you mad thing!

William the White · Post by **William the White** » Sun Feb 07, 2010 11:32 pm

Tonight I started to read a novel by one of my very favourite writers - Victor Serge. It's called 'The Long Dusk' and is set at the fall of Paris to the Nazis in 1940, and follows a group of refugees - political, criminal, fearful - as they move south, seeking some place of safety, some way of fleeing the country.

This novel has been out of print in English for decades and is the only one of Serge's seven novels I've never been able to obtain. In the last two years his final novel, The Unforgiving Years, was at last published in translation, I read it in Portugal on holiday, and his most famous one, The Case of Comrade Tulayev, was republished as a Penguin Classic. But still no sign of The Long Dusk.

Two years ago online, I found a copy in a second hand bookshop in the USA, but it cost £100 and I just couldn't convince myself to spend that much. Then, in another search, six weeks ago, I found a copy at 50 dollars, from an american rare/secondhand books online company. took a deep breath, bought it, with postage it cost me nearly 50 quid, which makes it the most expensive book I've ever bought. It arrived on Friday.

The paper is yellowing, it smells musty, the cover is tattered, it was published in 1946, a year before Serge died. But I have it at last. YESSS!!! I'm on page 82... But I know I'll finish it this week. And probably read it again next. I'm happy.

clapton is god · Post by **clapton is god** » Mon Feb 08, 2010 7:23 am

Mrs Clapton bought me a selection of books for Christmas one of which was Smiley's People by Le Carre. I never got around to reading this cold war series but starting with the third in the series would be a poor place to start.

Another (late) Christmas present was an Amazon Kindle, the DX version, and my first purchase for that was Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, the first in the Le Carre trilogy. I'm a good distance into it now and am finding it mesmerising! It might have taken me thirty years but I've discovered a new author.

The Kindle? Yes, I'm getting on okay with it. Not like holding a book, of course, but its good and we'll get along very well.

Dr Hotdog · Post by **Dr Hotdog** » Tue Feb 09, 2010 2:40 pm

Currently two-thirds of the way through Nineteen Eighty Four for the second time.

thebish · Post by **thebish** » Tue Feb 09, 2010 2:48 pm

currently reading "e" by Matt Beaumont - a book composed entirely of email correspondence between people at an advertising agency...

Puskas · Post by **Puskas** » Tue Feb 09, 2010 2:59 pm

thebish wrote:currently reading "e" by Matt Beaumont - a book composed entirely of email correspondence between people at an advertising agency...

A novel?

The future of the epistolary novel?

Or just a gimmick (like the one a few years back, composed of faxes)?

Does that form of novel have a future, anyway?

Questions, questions....

thebish · Post by **thebish** » Tue Feb 09, 2010 3:43 pm

Puskas wrote:
thebish wrote:currently reading "e" by Matt Beaumont - a book composed entirely of email correspondence between people at an advertising agency...
A novel?

The future of the epistolary novel?

Or just a gimmick (like the one a few years back, composed of faxes)?

Does that form of novel have a future, anyway?

Questions, questions....

'tis indeed a polylogic epistolary novel - and a "gimmick" like Dostoevsky's "Poor Folk" and Shelley's "Frankenstein", Balzac's "Letters of Two Brides" and Stoker's "Dracula"

the future of epistolary novels, though, I suspect, rests not in emails, but texts and facebook entries....

Dujon · Post by **Dujon** » Wed Feb 10, 2010 12:34 am

A week or so or go I came across a book on my shelves which I'm almost certain I hadn't read. Of course my memory's not too good these days (not that it ever was) but I usually remember a book within the first couple of pages when re-reading something that has slipped my mind. When that happens I usually put down the tome and try to remember as much as I can about it. Don't ask me why, but I do. Maybe it's a fear of senility stealthily stalking my synaptic streets in order to wreak havoc in the usually quiet neighbourhood of my cerebrum.

Whatever. The novel was conceived and written by one Andrew M. Greeley and is titled Angel Fire. I found it quite delightful. The plot revolves around one Professor Sean Sheamus Desmond, an American of Irish descent, and his guardian angel, Gabriella Light. When introduced to the reader the good professor is a Nobel laureate when he is in Stockholm to receive the honour. From then on the tale is a wonderful romp through the mind of the professor, his association with his estranged wife and his two daughters which, when combined with the efforts of someone or something designed to kill him, plus his perceived Irishness (even though he has never lived there), turns out to be an adventure of rather odd proportions.

It is fun, it is witty and it throws up a few questions about belief systems.

The copyright declaration indicates 1988 as the registration. My copy is a paperback issued under the Legend banner and published by Arrow. It is an imprint of the Random Century Group. As best I can work out it was printed in 1990.

Zulus Thousand of em · Post by **Zulus Thousand of em** » Sat Feb 20, 2010 6:37 am

Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K Jerome. I can't believe I missed this all these years. An excellent read.

I can now see where P G Wodehouse (whose work I enjoy immensely) got it from. Wodehouse is much more sophisticated and structured, for me, but it's a similar genre.

Raven · Post by **Raven** » Mon Feb 22, 2010 12:36 pm

Zulus Thousand of em wrote:Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K Jerome. I can't believe I missed this all these years. An excellent read.

I can now see where P G Wodehouse (whose work I enjoy immensely) got it from. Wodehouse is much more sophisticated and structured, for me, but it's a similar genre.

I'll second that, it is excellent.

Sure I have the Angel Fire book previously mentioned, if not might look that one up.

General Mannerheim · Post by **General Mannerheim** » Mon Feb 22, 2010 4:26 pm

Was recommended this book called ‘Screwed’ The truth about life as a prison officer by Ronnie Thompson, picked it up for buttons on Amazon pre-owned wotsit.

First page, Prologue, ‘cheers to’ … “and to Chris Moyles for being an absolute legend and entertaining me with his show”

FFS, shall i chuck it straight in the bin!?

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