What Are We Currently Reading?

[savannah1985]

I've just finished reading "The Autobiography of Malcolm X" by Alex Haley. Such a good book! I was surprised that I liked it so much, but I don't know why. Haley was a great writer and Malcolm X had a great story. I highly recommend.

[AltLivia]

Finished The Husband's Secret.  Wasn't expecting

Rachel to mow down Polly with her car. Or to mow anyone down, for that matter,

Darn it, book, I wasn't supposed to cry! Tried reading The Martian and just couldn't get through it. Kind of disappointed in myself for that one.  A good friend seems really into it and I wanted to discuss it.

 

Up next: In A Dark, Dark Wood by Ruth Ware.

[Qoass]

Ooh, I liked In A Dark, Dark Wood:  kind of Bridget Jones on a Train if you will...

 

I'm enjoying The Ex by Alafair Burke.  I think I know who did what already but I look forward to seeing if I'm right.

[magdalene]

I just finished reading Naomi Novik's Uprooted and I loved it.  Has anybody else here read it?

[Darian]

I liked In a Dark, Dark Wood, too. Those who know my taste are surprised that I like Liane Moriarty's books, but I have loved them all. I wait eagerly for the nex since I took out What Alice Forgot on a whim.

 

My Name is Lucy Barton did not disappoint. I followed it with The Weight of Heaven (not religious), which was quite good. Both were emotionally draining, so I next tried Secondhand Souls by Christopher Moore. He's usually a reliable, funny read for me, but I didn't even finish it. I even sent him a fan letter after A Dirty Job, thanking him for his portrayal of hospice nurses (I was one) and expressing sympathy for his loss (he explained in the acknowledgements how he came to know hospice). But this...maybe it's my memory. I couldn't remember enough about the book this is a sequel to, and I knew some characters and references were from other books. Even accepting I was going to be missing some of that, I just didn't enjoy it. Can't remember what else I read in between, but am now giving Ana of California a shot, but it's only ok. Good thing it's a quick read, then onto a few I've been waiting for that came up in my e-book library queue.         

[AuntiePam]

Two by George Gissing, a 19th century writer best known for New Grub Street, which was about a struggling writer. 

 

Gissing's stories are kinda like Dickens' in setting and characters, but without the imaginative character names (and the humor).  These two are The Odd Women, Gissing's take on women, marriage, and relationships, and The Nether World, about a solid young man's relationship with an impoverished family.  I love Gissing.  His books always make me glad I was born in the 20th century. 

[alias1]

I just finished reading Naomi Novik's Uprooted and I loved it.  Has anybody else here read it?

i just read this last month.  It's not my usual fare but I did enjoy it.   

[bmasters9]

Per a suggestion made on my post of James Herriot's All Creatures Great and Small: I am now reading that second big book of his, All Things Bright and Beautiful.

 

[jenh526]

A Manual for Cleaning Women by Lucia Berlin. It is amazingly good. She was an incredible lady, unfortunately largely unrecognized in her lifetime: http://luciaberlin.com/

[alias1]

I just finished My Name Is Lucy Barton, a deceptively simple story of family relationships, our memories, and what is said, and the many things that are never said.  I thought it was honestly and beautifully written.

[alias1]

I just started The Guest Room (3 or 4 chapters in) and Oh My!

 

I'm also reading The Promise, with my fictional boyfriend Elvis Cole.

[Qoass]

I'm reading Alice Hoffman's The Marriage of Opposites.  I love the way Hoffman writes but this one is not my favorite.  Nothing much seems to happen:  she just revisits the same points over and over and over.  Plus, despite the title, I don't think her message was supposed to be that women should be the equals of men in all things but that they also have no life beyond their husbands and children but that's what I'm getting.

[punkypower]

Trying to get out of my own head and back into my love--reading.

 

Didn't realize Will Elliott had written a sequel to The Pilo Family Circus. Indeed, he did, The Pilo Traveling Circus. You guys, if you like weird, you'll LOVE these books!! Bonus points if you're afraid of clowns! Linking to the original:

http://www.amazon.com/Pilo-Family-Circus-Will-Elliott/dp/0980226023

 

Got in yesterday and started devouring Juan Martinez' Convicted: The Untold Story of Putting Jodi Arias Behind Bars. About halfway through..

http://www.amazon.com/Conviction-Untold-Story-Putting-Behind/dp/006244428X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1455752852&sr=1-1&keywords=convicted+juan+martinez

[AltLivia]

Finished In A Dark, Dark Wood. I loved the writing itself, but the last third of the book sort of fell apart for me. I'd figured it out, so to speak, and was just waiting for it to dawn on the the characters  (painfully long wait). I enjoyed the connection between Nina and Nora, and Nora on her own, more than I enjoyed the mystery

 

I'd been reading that and Wild by Cheryl Strayed. I'm still reading and enjoying that.

[Jazzy24]

Am currently reading 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea

[alias1]

I finished When Breath Becomes Air.  It's always sad when someone dies so young.  But I can't say that I found it as compelling (or as well written) as I thought I would.  Maybe this should go in Unpopular Opinions.

 

I also finished The Guest Room, which was pretty compelling, and not at all what I thought it would be.  The plot involved the sex slave trade and how things can go wrong in an instant and change lives forever. 

 

And I read The Promise (Robert Crais) where he included the characters from his last book, Suspect, and also characters from his Elvis Cole series.  I really enjoyed this book. 

 

I have The Illuminae on my Kindle to be read next.  It's very long (and I'm not a fan of long books) but the reviews say it's fun.  Has anyone read this?

[Qoass]

I'm reading Every Last One by Anna Quindlen.  Every page seems familiar so I'm pretty sure I already read it but I'm enjoying it and I can't remember how it ends so what the heck.  I read upwards of three books a week sometimes and completely forget the last one the second I start the next one.

[OakGoblinFly]

I am nearly finished with Brandon Sanderson's The Bands of Mourning (one of his Mistborn novels).  Based on numerous recommendations and the excellent SyFy show, Leviathan Awakes by S,A. Corey is next in my queue (which is odd, becuase I rarely read a book after watch a film/television adaptation.

Edited February 22, 2016 by OakGoblinFly

[bmasters9]

Crazy Like A Fox: The Inside Story of How Fox News Beat CNN, by Scott Collins

 

 

[AltLivia]

Finished Wild. I cried. I truly enjoyed it.

 

Now reading Where'd You Go, Bernadette? by Maria Semple. Enjoying it some, laughing a lot, but there are large sections about architecture (nothing that includes Bernadette herself or her own projects). Those sort of have me kind of zoning out.

[alias1]

Finished Wild. I cried. I truly enjoyed it.

 

Now reading Where'd You Go, Bernadette? by Maria Semple. Enjoying it some, laughing a lot, but there are large sections about architecture (nothing that includes Bernadette herself or her own projects). Those sort of have me kind of zoning out.

I read Bernadette a while ago.  I liked it, but I didn't think it was nearly as good as some of the reviews said (certainly not 5 stars).  I often wonder who does these fake gushing reviews.  That's why I like to read the one and two star reviews for perspective.

[partofme]

I loved Where'd You Go, Bernadette?

 

But I agree with SierraMist, I love reading one and two star reviews even of books that I loved, they are far more interesting than the five star reviews.

[Darian]

I just read Aquarium by David Vann on a recommendation. It's about a 12-year-old-girl, who waits every after school at the aquarium for her single mother  to pick her up after work. I'd given it a try once, but stopped a few pages in as it didn't grab me and Vann doesn't use quotation marks for dialog. I find that an obnoxious stylistic choice and have given up on books just for that. But my friend urged me to try again and I'm glad I did. By the time I got to the end, unfortunately in public, I was crying.  

 

About to start The Turner House by Angelia Flournoy, which I kept seeing on "best of" lists. 

[Danny Franks]

Got halfway through Pirate Cinema by Cory Doctorow, before getting tired of him lecturing me (again) on all his current pet interests. The guy has such good ideas for books, but drains all the fun out of them by just constantly feeling the need to explain, 'so this is how a 3D printer works... and this is what a computer MAC address is... and this is how to make the very best sort of coffee', in minute detail. It's even more galling because his protagonists are always teenagers, so this condescending 'let me explain this to you' attitude is incredibly obnoxious.

 

I'm as done with his books now as I am with Adam Christopher's.

[ccphilly]

 

About to start The Turner House by Angelia Flournoy, which I kept seeing on "best of" lists.

 

 

I liked The Turner House just fine but I have no idea why people were losing their minds over it.  It was a well written story about an interesting family.  That's all I took from it.  Maybe I'm missing something!

[alias1]

I liked The Turner House just fine but I have no idea why people were losing their minds over it.  It was a well written story about an interesting family.  That's all I took from it.  Maybe I'm missing something!

I'm not really fond of family sagas, so not sure I will read this.  But when I looked it up, Holy Cow, it's practically on every "best of" list there is.   I'm anxious to hear some more real reviews.

[bmasters9]

[SeanC]

I just finished reading Raymond Chandler's The Little Sister, the fifth of the Philip Marlowe novels. Chandler's prose is extraordinarily expressive (particularly when, as I do, you read the whole thing in Humphrey Bogart's voice), but I can never keep track of all the details in any of these novels.

[AltLivia]

Finished Where'd You Go, Bernadette? Grew to hate it. Bee's father, secretary and neighbor richly deserved their upset. But by the end of it, I wish they'd all just decided they were better off without Bernadette.

 

Currently reading, and loving, The Magicians by Lev Grossman. I know folks have strong opinions on this one, but I can't put it down. Though where I am in my read, 

the Brakebills crew has graduated and are just skulking around Manhattan. It's dragging a bit.

 

Also reading non-fiction My Brain On Fire : My Month of Madness by Susannah Cahalan, which is fascinating and terrifying.

[MeloraH]

I just finished Big Little Lies in anticipation of the HBO miniseries coming out and ended up liking it a lot more than I thought I would, even like more than I thought I would when I was halfway through. I ended up being really invested in the characters and thought she pulled everything together really well at the end. It wasn't amazing but it was a fast read and towards the end hard to put down.

 

And I finished the three Magicians books not too long ago and ended up liking the whole world of it a lot. The first was my least favorite of the three, I think he got a lot better as a writer as the series went on and they expand to have more than one POV character which lessened my least favorite part of the first book, Quentin's inner life.

 

I'm a little more than halfway through Flood of Fire and I'm loving it as much as I did the first two in the trilogy. It makes me annoyed that I didn't learn more about the opium war in school. A country going to war over commerce with the corporation involved in the planning seems like an important thing to learn about.

[AuntiePam]

A God in Ruins by Kate Atkinson.  The ending was a surprise.  At first I was "WTF?" but after thinking about it, I decided I liked it.

 

Black Wings Has My Angel by Elliott Chaze, 50's noir -- classic -- brilliant -- the ending was very unsettling, haunting. 

[Bunty]

The new Patricia McKillip--Kingfisher

 

In the new fantasy from the award-winning author of the Riddle-Master Trilogy, a young man comes of age amid family secrets and revelations, and transformative magic.

 

http://www.penguin.com/book/kingfisher-by-patricia-a-mckillip/9780425271766

[Haleth]

I picked up The Bourbon Kings by J R Ward because it was on Amazon's best of the month list.  A drama about a family in the bourbon industry?  Sounded interesting.  Maybe I could learn something about the industry.  Yeah, no.  It was terrible.  Chock full of soap opera cliches, not one character who was likable, dreadful dialog.  It was utter dreck.  Plus there were a lot of errors in little details that I found annoying.  So it is apparently the first of a series.  I will not be looking for the next one.

a young man comes of age amid family secrets and revelations, and transformative magic.

 

Oh, good.  Something different.  LOL

[GaT]

Interesting about The Bourbon Kings. I read The Black Dagger Brotherhood books, but didn't pick this book up because I only like paranormal romance, not regular romance. Sounds like I made the right choice.

[alias1]

I picked up The Bourbon Kings by J R Ward because it was on Amazon's best of the month list.  A drama about a family in the bourbon industry?  Sounded interesting.  Maybe I could learn something about the industry.  Yeah, no.  It was terrible.  Chock full of soap opera cliches, not one character who was likable, dreadful dialog.  It was utter dreck.  Plus there were a lot of errors in little details that I found annoying.  So it is apparently the first of a series.  I will not be looking for the next one.

Oh, good.  Something different.  LOL

I'm beginning to think that someone is paying Amazon to put certain books on their best of the month list.  I'm finding it  a mixed bag, too.

[alias1]

Last year I read Circling The Sun and I just wasn't a fan of the book.  She did not convey to me how extraordinary this woman was.  So I decided to read Beryl Markham's own book, West With The Wind.  She was not only a remarkable woman, but I was surprised at how eloquently she could write.  That fictionalized account of her life pales by comparison.

[Bunty]

a young man comes of age amid family secrets and revelations, and transformative magic.

 

Oh, good.  Something different.  LOL

Heh.  McKillip is actually playing with Arthurian themes intermixing them with the modern world.

[SmithW6079]

I picked up The Bourbon Kings by J R Ward because it was on Amazon's best of the month list. A drama about a family in the bourbon industry? Sounded interesting.

For a moment, I thought you were describing a book about the Bourbon kings of France, which I would totally read. Edited March 8, 2016 by SmithW6079

[Pepper Mostly]

I'll Never Write My Memoirs by Grace Jones. True to form, Grace is obscure, tantalizing, refusing to be defined. Don't read for lots of juicy gossip, she's pretty cagey. But its entertaining in an impressionistic, stream of consciousness way.

[Snow Apple]

I just finished Tom Jones' autobiography. The beginning about his childhood was great, but it got kind of boring once he made it in show business. The majority of the book is about his career (which I can read about on wikipedia) and not many personal stories. A shame since there was such spark in the few stories he sprinkled in about himself and the celebrities he met.

[proserpina65]

Finally finished Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink by Elvis Costello.  Anyone interested in his work or in pop music in general should read it if they get a chance, because it's a fascinating glimpse into his life, background and music, with a lot of detail about his working process over the years.  But be aware that it's not necessarily an easy or quick read (I mean that in a good way).  It's more stream of conciousness than linear and goes off on tangents and flights of fancy on a regular basis so reading it requires one's complete attention, but it is well worth it in the end.  I feel like I have an entirely new understanding of his music as a result.  And as someone who never quite got the switch from Cait O'Riordan to Diana Krall, I can say that I get it know, given what he wrote about each of them.  Plus some of his stories are really funny, and the stuff about his grandmother and his father is quite touching and more than a little sad.

Edited March 11, 2016 by proserpina65

[MeloraH]

And as someone who never quite got the switch from Cait O'Riordan to Diana Krall, I can say that I get it know, given what he wrote about each of them.

 

Interesting, it's on my to read list but I haven't read a lot of reviews.. Have you read James Fearnley's memoir? The Cait/Elvis parts of it were pretty entertaining although I was more interested in the Joe Strummer/Danielle Von Zerneck (Donna from La Bamba)/Fearnley quasi-love triangle. This is kind of OT but I always wish Cait had had more of a solo career, I absolutely love her vocals.

 

Back on topic, I just started Antonia Fraser's bio of Mary Queen of Scots and it's kind of dry so far but Mary's only like 5 and just got to France so it should pick up. It made me wonder how, if at all, related to the Arran Hamilton's Alexander Hamilton is. I'm also like 150 pages into Siege and Storm the second book of the Grisha trilogy and I already like it better than the first one and I liked the first one quite a bit.

[AltLivia]

Finished The Magicians, the first in the series. Lots of unexpected twists - if the show tackles most of the action, half the budget will be makeup and effects! It should be gory and intense. On the negative side,

Alice- who I loved and found as realistic as a person can be, in these novels - is out commission. Not to mention, Penny, its most competent caster.

 

Now we have....Julia. I don't know if the Syfy installment's "magic as a drug" take mirrors the novel. But Julia is stilted in the worst way and Quentin's romanticizing of her "mysterious past" is obnoxious. I truly don't care for Julia, thus far, but I'm trying to be open as I read The Magician King.

[raezen]

Recently I read The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion and The Good Luck of Right Now by Matthew Quick, so I guess you could say that I definitely am ODing on Rom-coms. I definitely liked the former better than the latter, although it was the most that read like a Hollywood Rom-com, and like all Rom-coms for me the final arc always risks ruining my enjoyment of the whole piece.

[alias1]

Recently I read The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion and The Good Luck of Right Now by Matthew Quick, so I guess you could say that I definitely am ODing on Rom-coms. I definitely liked the former better than the latter, although it was the most that read like a Hollywood Rom-com, and like all Rom-coms for me the final arc always risks ruining my enjoyment of the whole piece.

I liked The Rosie Project a lot.  The sequel, The Rosie Effect, was a total letdown. 

 

I'm pretty sure I read The Good Luck of Right Now but couldn't remember a thing about it.   I had to look it up and I do remember the Richard Gere thing and absolutely nothing else.  I guess it didn't make a very big impression on me.

[raezen]

You didn't remember Cat Parliament? ! Which doesn't exist anymore because with modern animal shelters all the cats in Ottawa were being adopted into homes. I recently read an opinion by someone that the 'Girlbrarian's ' brother reminded them of Charlie Day. Personally, I had caught an episode of The Trailer Park Boys, just days before I read TGLoRN and I could help but picture Bubbles (with a different accent and more hyper, of course), and I almost wondered if Matthew Quick had been influence by the show. Thick bottle glasses and a love of cats? Check. Swearing and more swearing? Check.

Edited March 14, 2016 by raezen

[SeanC]

The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith: Or Carol, as one imagines it will be mainly known going forward, thanks to the film adaptation that I still haven't been able to see. This was a relatively mainstream lesbian romance novel published in 1952 that has a fairly happy ending, so it has considerable interest as an historical item. But thankfully, it's also quite good, even if in the early chapters the main character sometimes skirts Holden Caulfield levels of irritating discontentment.

[Cobalt Stargazer]

On a similar note, I just finished Make Room! Make Room! by Harry Harrison, the book that eventually became Soylent Green. Not a bad read, with a proper feeling of claustrophobia you'd get from living in a city that's way overcrowded and crime-ridden. But there is no mention of

Soylent Green being people

, so someone else must have come up with that tidbit.

 

I'm not sure if I need to spoil that, but I did anyway to be on the safe side.

[OakGoblinFly]

Even though the quality has fallen off lately, I am reading Crimson Shore, the 15th book in the Agent Pendergast series by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. I have to admit this one is better than the last three or four books, there's a lot of Constance Greene and I find her an interesting character.

 

I can't help it, Agent Pendergast is one of my favorite characters and I enjoy reading about him (even in less than stellar stories).  I find it hard to break up with him - much I like I find it difficult to completely break with Harry Dresden.

[partofme]

I just read and highly recommend In a Dark, Dark Wood.

I didn't like The Guest Room at all. I've loked other books by the author but thought this was poorly written.