Badmovies.org Forum

[Edit: Continued from http://www.badmovies.org/forum/index.php/topic,122070.0.html (http://www.badmovies.org/forum/index.php/topic,122070.0.html)]

Time for a new reading thread.

I finally finished reading Mark Twain's 1860s reports home from Hawaii.

I am in the middle of a biography of William McKinley.

Monty Python Speaks! by David Morgan

Facts from Peggy Orenstein's Boys and Sex : Young Men on Hookups, Love, Porn, Consent, and Navigating the New Masculinity. A sequel to her earlier Girls and Sex.

1. While we think of young men, as being a group, we ought to, instead, think of them as being individuals.

2. Young women have made more progress navigating the new sexuality than young men.

3. If we neglect our young women, when it comes to the new sexuality, we neglect our young men even more.

4. While young men may be less vulnerable to sexual exploitation than young women, they are still vulnerable, which makes them in some ways even more vulnerable.

5. It is a problem that has no easy solutions.

6. Not only do some men want to turn the clock back to the old sexuality, so do some women.

7. As sad as all this may be, there is still hope today and in the future.

8. Today, we are more accepting of young men who are sexually different than we have been in the passt.

9. Tomorrow, the young men of today know what they are missing, and it is with hope, that they will, when they have young men of their own, will fill in what is missing.

10. I have never seen higher reviews for a book on Amazon, then I have for this one. Almost all 5* reviews.

Next time: we will see what we may see.

Yeah, since they re-invented sex we now have that whole new way babies get made. Personally I think the old method had a lot going for it. (People shore do like to re-make the wheel.)

One Flew Over the Cukoos Nest by Ken Kesey.
In the novel, it's narrated by Chief, the big Indian guy.

Just picked up "Film Out of Bounds: Essays and Interviews in Non-Mainstream Cinema Worldwide." Covers Neil Jordan, Herschell Gordon Lewis, Dario Argento and Guy Maddin, among others.

On my best friend's recommendation, I'm reading SARUM: THE NOVEL OF ENGLAND by Edward Rutherford.
It's a marvelous, sprawling historical epic.

I got a copy of "Nostromo" by Joseph Conrad from my local library just before the quarantine. I was expecting it to last longer than usual on my nightstand, but now there's no pressure or need to call for an extension.

It's a fascinating book. It deals with a series of characters -mostly expatriates- living in an imaginary latinamerican country towards the end of the XIXth century. The point of view is debatable -we're supposed to despise the locals and root for the foreigners who run things instead-, but the personal stories are fantastic and the language is a thing of beauty.

I've had a love-hate relationship with Conrad for years, but this novel has definitely won me over.

Just placed in my bathroom:

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Since they didn't tape the show, this is my only opportunity to see (in my mind's eye) the re-riff of EEGAH.

blind voices by tom reamy, a brilliant writer who died far too young. i've had this for 41 years now, and i read it every year. it haunts me.

Celine "Journey to the end of Night"

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A lot of people don't like the Medveds because they're too snarky and seem like they don't truly love the movies they criticize, but they are the pioneers of "bad movie" appreciation.

Just started a critical biography of Luis Bunuel titled "Luis Bunuel."

"outside looking in" by t.c.boyle.

"50 greatest movies never Made"

I read this 20 years ago and i think i posted it here? anyway is about movies that were almost made but weren't, ultimately. One was a comedy called Jaws 3, People 0, written by national Lampoon and sounds like it was pretty funny. the studios decided to do Jaws 3 in 3d instead.

Hitchcock had one that was a blind man regains his sight, then goes to disneyland where some sort of caper happens. Walt Disney hated Psycho and it never came off.

The guy who made Ren and Stimpy had a script for a ridiculous movie about 4 guys who think superheroes are wimps because they have super powers. They build their own headquarters because they are real men. Ultimately, they are so tough they punch a hole in time itself and then the trouble starts


https://www.amazon.com/50-Greatest-Movies-Never-Made/dp/031220082X (https://www.amazon.com/50-Greatest-Movies-Never-Made/dp/031220082X)

very cool book that would probably be a Medium post you would never find out about today

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Written by a friend of mine (who had some posts on here years ago, though I don't remember what handle he used). About his unhappy upbringing in a Pentecostal sect. I read a couple of idfferent early drafts, and from what I've read so far it's really come far.

The Dragonlance trilogy.

THE UNEXPECTED PRESIDENT: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF CHESTER A. ARTHUR by Scott S. Greenberger

An entertaining and sympathetic look at the life of the only American President I can say with some confidence I am related to.  Arthur was James Garfield's Vice President and stepped into the presidency when Garfield was murdered in 1881.  Arthur was a lifelong political hack, a corrupt spoilsman in thrall to New York's notorious boss, Senator Roscoe Conkling.  But Arthur surprised everyone be becoming a champion of Civil Service Reform and honest government as President, cutting his ties to his corrupt former associates and signing the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act into law.  I knew a little bit about his career, but this biography filled in a lot of corners and brought this New York dandy who turned into a model of Presidential character into sharp focus.  Highly recommended!

And according to Crow T. Robot's report on Rutherford B. Hayes, a founding member of ZZ Top.

http://www.mst3kinfo.com/ward_e/Bit510.html (http://www.mst3kinfo.com/ward_e/Bit510.html)

I guess these count.

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I started pilling Walter Mosley and James Lee Burke novels when the confinement starte, and I still have a few left.

Mosley writes these great detective novels starring black detective Easy Rawlings. They all take place after WWII in LA, and they have some great social commentary together with the misteries. Mosley has other series as well, but I'm sticking to this one until I read them all.

The first novel was made into a pretty good film, "Devil in a blue dress", starring Denzel.

As for James Lee Burke, I'm a fan of his Dave Robicheaux series. They follow the cases of a mature NOPD in Lousiana. The series is very long, and has some great titles as well as others that are just ho-hum. The best I can remember right now are "The Tin Roof Blowdown", which deals with Katrina and its aftermath, and its inmediate sequels. However, Burke is like 80 right now, and I think he should consider ending the series before they become a caricature.

And again, a couple of them have film versions: "Heaven's Prisoners", a sweaty, violent thriller starring Alec Baldwin, and "In the electric mist", starring Tommy Lee Jones. If you watch the latter, make sure to get the extended international cut rather than the American one.

My sis also asked me to recover a few of her old favorites from the attic, and I also found some vintage Jim Thompson and John Godey for me. As you see, I like crime novels.

I been re-re-re-rereading the four Messages From Michael books this summer. I used to be tangentially connected with CQY/Sarah Chambers' group (as opposed to the dozens of fake Michael groups---the ones that charge money and tell everyone they're old souls on a young soul planet) through a friend and after twenty years of being intrigued by the Michael material, it was soon disillusioningly like seeing the man behind the curtain, so reading the books now arises from a different perspective than I had in high school and later. It's still an intriguing system if approached as a way to stereotype personalities for fun, just one presented differently from the reality of how things truly are in the group, which is far different than the books.

About to start this one:

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Chapters on Abel Ferrara,Radley Metzger, Melvin van Peebles, Doris Wishman, biker films, Harmony Korine, Herschel Gordon Lewis, and others.

Keep meaning to ask if you've read all the OOtS stuff, or even played the boardgame Rev?

No, I gave not played the boardgame, but I have read all the comics.

The game is a bit too long to really work, so you aren't missing anything there. Glad I am not the only one here who reads it.

The hardcopy collections for Order of the Stick are nice, but the author notes frequently make him come across as pompous. And hoo boy does he ever have daddy issues. I suppose I could just not read the notes, but it's like a pile-up in that you can't not look. And occasionally there's an interesting tidbit.

I can't argue with you there. I like his comics, but I'm not sure I'd want to share a beer with him.

I actually really enjoy the insights into why he structures the story the way he does. I think they are aimed mainly at other writers.

I also started

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I'm doing a break in my diet of crime novels and I'm now reading the Lapierre / Collins bestseller "Freedom at Midnight". It's a detailed account of the events that lead to the independence of India and the creation of Pakistan. It's very pro-British, reading it you'd never think GB did anything wrong by conquering India, but an absorbing read anyway. The portraits of Louis Mountbatten and Gandhi are very interesting, but also the accounts of the reasons why Hindu, Muslim and Sikh refused to share the same country after its liberation.

I recently finished reading The Good Shepard By C. S. Forester, so when I saw the opening of the trailer for Greyhound I realized it's now a Tom Hanks movie. I'm hoping the film is as good as the book.

I've decided to spend the next year reading few to no new books, but going back and re-reading books I loved in the past.

On my list:

LOTR
The Little House books
The Voyage of the Beagle
Harry Potter
Night-Side, by Joyce Carol Oates
If You Could See Me Now, by Peter Straub
Creation, by Gore Vidal
This Side of Paradise, by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Several Far Side Collections
The Little Stranger, by Sarah Waters
Cash: The Autobiography, by Johnny Cash
The Complete Stories of Flannery O'COnnor
Night Shift, by Stephen King
The Valley of Fear, by Arthur Conan Doyle
Lost in the Forest, by Sue Miller
A Song of Fire and Ice
The Memoirs of Julia Dent Grant

and if I make it that far I'll (be surprised) maybe throw in The Ruins, by Scott Smith.

All these books meant something to me at one point or another in my life, and while I guess it can be hazardous to memory to re-read old favorites in another era of life, it might also be a happy experience. I'll tell you guys how it goes.

Then I may spend a year after that reading books I always meant to get around to reading but never did. Books like:

The Reivers, by William Faulkner
Marvel 1602, by Neil Gaiman
The Tale of Genji, by Murasaki Shikibu
The Unaborted Socrates, by Peter Kreeft (a teacher gave this to me in high school and I've never opened it)
The Aeneid, by Virgil

 
(Heck that list could go on forever...)

Or, you know, maybe I won't. We'll see. Namaste.

http://youtu.be/qw8HhTnot0w (http://youtu.be/qw8HhTnot0w)

Haven't read the book. Haven't seen the film, so I can't say whether the film is as good as the book, but I have seen the trailer, and I'd say it certainly is something different for Hanks. One of those films that was suppose to get a theatrical release, but, because of the pandemic was shown on one of the streaming services.

Ye-es!
6 of 1

Michael Stanley
(Michael Sears and Stanley Trollop. South African writing duo)
award winners
Shoot the bastards
1st in the Crystal Nguyen series
+ 7 more fiction in 1 more series
Heroine: Asian American
Places: Mozambique, South Africa, Switzerrland, U.S., Vietnam
Time: Present


Michael Stanley
(Michael Sears and Stanley Trollop. South African writing duo)
award winners
Facets of death
7th in the Detective Kubu series
+1 more fiction in 1 more series
Hero: Motswana
Place: Botswana
Time: 1990s


Kathleen Kent
American
The burn
2nd in the Detective Betty Rhyzyk series
Heroin: Polish American
Place: New York City and Dallas (Texas)
Time: 2010s with a flashback to the 1990s


Catherine Lloyd
ex-Pat Brit
Death comes to the nursery
7th in the Kurland St. Mary series
Heroine: Brit
Place: U.K.
Time: 1820s


Martin Limon
American
G.I. Confidential
14th in the Sueno and Bascom series
+1 short story collection
Heroes: Mexican American and Caucasian
Place: South Korea
Time: 1970s


Rebecca Roanhorse
Native American
award winner
Star Wars : Resistance Reborn
part of Journey to Star Wars : the Rise of Skywalker
prequel to the film


Danny Fingeroth
American
A Marvelous life :
the Amazing story of Stan Lee
6 more non-fiction

Next time: a half dozen more

The Flesh Eaters by LA Morse.

I'm rereading "Immoral Tales: European Sex & Horror Movies 1956–1984." Some of you have probably read it and if not, you probably should.

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Well, now  that we have found you, here are a half dozen more that I have read.

Disney Princess Cross-Stitch :
22 easy to follow patterns featuring
Ariel, Belle. Jasmine, Mulan, and more . . .

and more . . .
Aurora, Cinderella, Merida, Pocahontas, Rapunzel, Snow White, and Tiana.


Jean Luc Banalee
ex-pat French or ex-pat German
The Killing Tide
translated by Peter Miller
5th in the Brittany mystery series
1st published in 2016
translation published in 2020
Hero: French
Place: Brittany (France)
Time: Present


Mike Isaac
American
award winner
Super pumped :
the battle for Uber


Eiily Griffiths
Brit
award winner
Now you see them
5th in the Magic men series
11 more fiction in 1 more series + 1 stand alone
Heroine: Brit
Place: U.K.
Time: 1960s


Cavan Scott
Brit
Star Wars :
Dooku : Jedi lost
10 more fiction in 3 more series


Martin Edwards
Brit
award winner
The measure of malice :
scientific detection stories
edited and introduced by Martin Edwards
14 stories published bteween 1891 and 1955 in which the detective uses scientific deduction to solve a crime.


Next time: 6 more

A Coffin Full Of Dreams by Frisco Hitt.

Ye-es!
6 more

1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Elly Griffiths
Brit
award winner
The Lantern Men
12th in the Ruth Galloway series + 5 more in 1 more series + 1 stand alone
Heroine: Brit
Place: U.K.
Time: Present with flashbacks to 2007


Alexander Freed
American
Star Wars : Shadow Fall
2nd in the Alphabet Squaeron trilogy
4 more fiction in the Star Wars series


Rae Carson
American
Star Wars : the Rise of Skywalker
expanded edition
novelization of the screenplay
2 more Star Wars + 8 more fiction in 2 more series


Timothy Zahn
American
award winner
Thrawn Ascendeency : Chaos Rising
1st in the 2nd Thrawn trilogy
14 more Star Wars

Whereas, the 1st trilogy took place between Solo and Rebels. This takes place in an earlier time between Atack of the Clones and Return of the Sith.


Star Wars : the Force Awakens
grphic novelization of the screenplay


Next time: something a little different. Only 1 or 2 at a time, but with more detail.

Eric  Jay Dolin
American
award winner
 
A Furious Sky :
the Five Hundred Year History of America's hurricanes
8 more non-fictrion

While there have been individual books about individual hurricanes, this is one of the few that cover almost the entire history of hurricanes  from 1502 to 2019. Of the 46 hurricanes for which we have a death toll and/or are covered in some depth, we have a total death toll of 51,817 or 1126.5 per hurricane. Probably only earthquakes cause more loss of life per disaster than hurricanes. And that figure is probably an undercount, as in 1980 the way deaths from hurricanes was changed.

1502-1979 only people killed directly by the hurricane during the hurricane were counted, but, in . . .
1980-2019 people who died indirectly, or people who would not have died otherwise,  before or after the hurricane were counted as victims.

Hurricanes have not only had affects on meteorlogy, but also on . . .
the arts (including films) -- botany -- history -- literature (both fiction and non-fiction) -- politics -- and zoology . . .
according the the writer.

If there is one knock I have is that the writer does not cover Central America, which we know from this year, is part of the Americas and is threatened by hurricanes. The writer actually spends more time in the Pacific, which should be out of the scope of this book, then he does Central America.

Next time: A. J. Baines' Dewey Defeats Truman

The above is so wide ranging in its coverage of hurricanes in America, over the past 500 years, the following people have some connection with hurricanes and thus are associated with the subject.

John James Audubon
Dave Barry -- Clara Barton -- Mary McLeod Bethune -- David Brinkley
Christopher Columbus -- Walter Cronkite
Margery Stoneman Douglas -- Michael Eric Dyson
Colin Farrell -- Henry Morrison Flagler -- Benjamin Franklin
William F. "Bull" Halsey -- Alexander Hamilton -- Katherine Hepburn -- Ernest Hemingway -- Zora Neale Hurston
Thomas Jefferson -- Sebastian Junger
Dr. Juanita Kreps
Jean Lafitte
Samuel F. B. Morse -- Edward R. Murrow
Sam Neill
Dan Rather -- Franklin Delano Roosevelt -- John Ruskin
Stephen Spielberg
and Bernard Vonnegut (Kurt's elder brother)

and next time: A. J. Baines' Dewey Defeats Truman

I'm reading the collected works of George Leigh Mallory, the English mountaneer who died while trying to reach the Everest summit in the 1920s. They are a bit arid, but things pick up when he chronicles his expeditions to the Everest and the difficulties he saw in reaching its top.

When I'm done it's hard boiled time again, either Mike Hammer ("Kiss me deadly") or Easy Rawlins ("Little scarlet"). Unless I find something that catches my eye at the local library.

A. J. Baines
American
Dewey Defeats Truman : the 1948 Election and the Battle for America's Soul
4 more non-fiction

in which the writer points out at least a dozen haunting parallels between 1948 and 2020.
like no other that I have seen, he puts a face on the election.
while we have known the results for 72 years, he still manages to create some suspense.
and while there have been individual books about each of the individual candidates, treating them not as individuals, but, as an equal part of the whole makes, as in Aesop's fable, a stronger whole.
in the end, the best man won.

A. J.. Baines' Dewey Defeats Truman

And thou shalt knoweth them by their supporters,

Wallace
aaron copland -- arthur miller -- charlie chaplin -- clifford odets -- edward g. robinson -- frank lloyd wright -- helen keller -- lillian hellman -- norman mailer -- paul robeson -- pete seeger -- studs terker -- thomas mann -- w.e.b. dubois

Truman
archibald macleish -- carson mccullers -- conrad aiken -- georgie jessel -- humphrey bogart -- lauren bacall -- perle "the hostess with the mostest" mesta -- ronald reagan -- sinclair lewis -- truman capote

Dewey
barbara stanwyck -- ginger rogers -- jeanette mcdonald -- john wayne -- lionel barrymore --  randolph scott -- walt disney

Thurmond
?

Harold Hober
American
award winner
The President vs. the PRess :
the Endless Battle between the White House and the Media --
from the Founding Fathers to Fake News.
39 more non-fiction.

To be continued . . .

TITAN: THE LIFE OF JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER by Ron Chernow

I knew a little bit about J.D. Rockefeller - one of the original robber barons, America's first billionaire, founder of Standard Oil, and philanthropist extraordinaire - but this rich, detailed biography provided a remarkable picture of a very complex man.  Absolutely ruthless in his business practices, and yet undeniably generous and kind-natured, Rockefeller is a study of everything that is wrong and right about capitalism, all in one package.  He built his empire by crushing or buying out all his competitors, but then gave away hundreds of millions of dollars to a variety of worthy causes before his death at the age of 98 in 1937.  Pioneering medical research, fighting infectious diseases, patronizing the arts, championing conservation - it is hard to imagine how any man of his generation could have done more good for a greater variety of causes.  But his use of monopoly to achieve dominance and his cut-throat business methods led to him being branded as a poster child for the evils of runaway corporatism.  In short, Rockefeller was both hero and villain, and defies all attempts to pigeonhole him into any particular stereotype.  Overall, an excellent read!  5/5

I'll be starting THE WEIRD AND THE EERIE by Mark Fisher tonight.

RICHARD AND JOHN: KINGS AT WAR by Frank McLynn

   There is an ongoing trend in modern academia to tear down heroes and rehabilitate villains, and nowhere is this more evident in the way that many historians have written about the two sons of Henry II of England, Richard the Lionheart and John Softsword.  Richard, the famous crusader king, has been vilified as a brute homosexual thug, an inept diplomat, and an arrogant, corrupt warmonger; while John has been painted as a skilled diplomat, courageous warrior, and superb administrator.  McLynn goes back to the primary sources to see which version is true, and in so doing he eviscerates the sloppy scholarship and academic bias of Richard's detractors and John's admirers to arrive at a truth first proclaimed during these men's lives: that Richard was a brave warrior, an excellent diplomat, and a much-loved King; while John was a vile person and a failed monarch.  Well-written, thoroughly researched, and easy to follow despite its bulk, this book held up just as well in its second reading as it did the first time I read it several years back.  Definitely worthwhile for anyone who enjoys British history!

I have a relative who worked directly for David Rockefeller in 30 Rock, so I was able to meet him and shake his hand (this would have been when he was in his early 80s).  He of course remembered his grandfather and could talk about him, as he died when he was in his early 20s - which is just fascinating to think about in terms of history and how close seemingly distant times really are.  I'll have to read this one, maybe I can follow it with David's memoirs which I started to read (the opening is about JD's death if memory serves, so it'd work as a followup) but didn't finish.  He signed it to me, so it's my own tiny connection to Rockefeller history.

That said..  I'm reading the Cloud Roads by Martha Wells, a VERY VERY different book.  Pure high fantasy.  If you like non-human protagonists, it's a pretty interesting one, worth a read.  I'm about a third through it.

Standard Oil was THE great American company. Before they came in oil was found and taken out of the ground in haphazard ways. They revolutionized the industry. better methods and lower prices for consumers

I'm now reading Mary, the final in Sholem Asch's New testament trilogy for which he was banned from Israel, though that's where his archive is now. The first was the Nazarene which was the New Testament, then The Apostle which was the letters.

PRESIDENT WITHOUT A PARTY: THE LIFE OF JOHN TYLER by Christopher J. Leahy

John Tyler holds a number of records as President: He was the first "accidental President," a Vice President who succeeded to the Presidency when his predecessor died (after only 31 days in office!); he fathered more children than any President (15 kids across two marriages); first to get married while in office (he was 53, she was 22!), and the ONLY President who sided with the Confederacy during the American Civil War.  Tyler's political philosophy  was heavily influenced by the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions of 1798; ultimately, he placed states' rights over the Federal government and was one of the guiding forces behind Virginia's decision to leave the Union.  He never understood or sympathized with the abolitionist movement, believing slavery a necessary evil that would fade with time.  This was a well-written biography of an interesting (if deeply flawed) man. 

BTW: Fun fact:  Although John Tyler was born in 1790, he had two grandchildren still alive when this book was published in 2019!

Started

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It's being made into a movie and for once I'm going to read the novel first. (That's usually a bad idea, I find, because you imagine the characters looking certain ways... then they don't.)

OLD BONES by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

  This is a spinoff series from the wildly popular "Agent Pendergast" novels that these two have been writing since the 1990's.  Two of Pendergast's more memorable associates, Corrie Swanson - now a newly minted FBI agent - and Nora Kelly, forensic anthropologist, team up investigating a long-lost campsite where part of the infamous Donner Party perished in 1847 amid horrifying scenes of madness and cannibalism.  But someone is trying to recover the remains of one of these long-dead cannibals, and is willing to kill to get his hands on them.  A nice, satisfying thriller!

Exile’s Quest by Richard Meade

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Sort of a girly, intellectual book about a woman helping a friend who's dying of cancer. Picked it up on a whim but I admit I'm enjoying it despite the fact that it's not in my usual wheelhouse.

THE YEARS OF LYNDON JOHNSON: THE PATH TO POWER by Robert A. Caro
I have had this book for at least 20 years - I think I may have even inherited it from my Dad; honestly, I'm not sure where I got it - but I had never read it until this month.  What a BRILLIANT biography!  Of course, it covers only the first 32 years of Lyndon Johnson's colorful life, but Caro went to many living sources to compile this story, and it is a compelling view of a cunning, ambitious, brilliant, and altogether ruthless young man whose only abiding principle seemed to be the pursuit of power.   Johnson is show as a calculating, amoral young man who would attach himself like a barnacle to anyone who could advance his career and jettison them the moment he found someone who could help him more effectively.  Yet, at the same time, he was incredibly hardworking, and got more done for folks in his district and out of it than any member of Congress.  I'm very excited about continuing the series, the second book is sitting on my dining table right now and I will be ordering the other two when I finish it. 5/5 - this book is what biographies should be!

I'm reading the First Law trilogy by Joe Abercrombie.  Piling through them really, for me.  I read the first two books over about a month, and am a third of the way through the third.

If you've ever read a fantasy trilogy and thought wow, this is really overly dense and verbose I wish it was half as long, you'd like this series.  It's a dark medieval fantasy, brutally violent and harsh, and VERY fast moving.  It also has some of the most compelling characters around.  Like one of the POV leads is Glokta, a former "heroic soldier" ideal type who was brutally mutilated and tortured after getting his platoon killed, and now is an imperial "interrogator" himself.  Or Logen Ninefingers, who is basically a barbarian who has burned out on killing people, but still has to keep doing it anyway. 

Yet it goes in a bit different directions than you might expect.  An underlying current that's interesting - most of the POV leads are, at best, drawn in shades of grey, yet they have a small but (at times unfortunately) undercurrent of kindness running through them that occasionally peaks out in unexpected ways, and sometimes sends the story going in a direction you wouldn't guess.

Very much recommended. 

THE CASE FOR JESUS by Brant Pitre

This is a short but very readable book that takes some of the most popular arguments against the accuracy of the New Testament and refutes them one by one. Pitre addresses ideas popularized by recent skeptics like Bart Ehrman using hard data and solid analysis.  Among the topics he takes on:

Were the Gospels anonymously written and then attributed to the traditional authors to give them greater credibility?
Were the Gospels written too late to contain eyewitness testimony?
Were the stories in the Gospels exaggerated and significantly altered between the time they happened and the time they were written down?
Did Jesus truly claim to be God?

I've read a number of books on both sides of the argument, and this is one of the best and most succinct I have read in defending the traditional claims of the NT.

Just put

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in the bathroom.

Loved the story of their difficulties in finding a copy of That Hagen Girl.

Got the first five books of The Expanse series for my birthday and am currently hallway through Caliban's War. It's sooooo much better than the TV series, to the point that I think I'll pass on the sixth season when Amazon puts it up.

well i'm now reading Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King (2014) i had read #196 pages  of it and than i just didn't feel like reading anymore and it wasn't cause i thought the book was bad either. i picked it back up late Friday night Early Saturday Morning and now i've read over 40 pages! i'm on page #244 thus far anyways and i hope to finish it this time

well i finished it yesterday and i liked it but it's not gonna be among my favorites and it honestly didn't feel like a King novel either and that's not a bad thing either.

it's not anything against the novel is what i'm saying  i'd say 8/10.     now i'm reading the Killer's Wedge by Ed McBain (1959)  the i think 7th or 8th 87th Precinct novel i forget which

Rocks: My Life In and Out of Aerosmith, by Joe Perry with David Ritz

honestly i had no idea Joe Perry even wrote a book to be honest

well i finished that book that was the 8th by the way & now i'm reading the 9th called Till Death and this one i've read a few times through the years and i think it's one of the best ones but i haven't read it in years though so i actually do not  remember anything about it

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Not going to be easy reading, but it's been sitting in my "to get to" pile forever and it's time to do it!

i finished 2 books 1. Death Du Juror (1999) by Kathy Reighs which i think i spelled wrong? i never can seem to spell it right i guess lol. but she created the character Bones from the same show though in the book she's not called that and the book i read was the 2nd book in her Temperance Brennan book series.

i love the show but when i started the 1st book a couple years back and read that i knew it was gonna be completely different and it is and that's not a bad thing either, well that was yesterday morning i finished that and this morning i finished another one  Unnatural Exposure (1997( by Patrica Cornwell i started this sucker which is book #8 in her Scarpetta series than at some point i just didn't feel like reading anymore and it wasn't cause the book was bad either.

i get that way sometimes for some strange reason anyways, it only had like i think 74 pages left and i finished that last night in fact and both books were pretty good actually.

now i'm reading Patrica Cornwell's 9th book Point of Origin (1998)  this one i haven't read yet i'm only on like page 6 i think? on how long i've had this damn book i bought it in like (1999) when the paperback came out so it took me over 20 years to finally get around to actually reading it! anyone take that long to read a book they bought or was given years ago?

East of West by Jonathan Hickman. Cyberpunk western with the four horsemen and a very different America. It's pretty interesting so far.

i'm currently reading 2 books actually i read whatever the hell i'm in the mood for that's just the way i roll i guess. i've always been that way so the one i'm reading tonight it's the 10th book in the Kay Scarpetta series Black Notice (1999) by Patrica Cornwell  & the other is book #3 Deadly Decisions by Kathy Reichs (2000)

one i'm only on chapter 5 in Black Notice and i think Chapter maybe 3 in Deadly decisions i forget

Oliver Stone's CHASING THE LIGHT: a really good book about his life and attempts to break into Hollywood.

https://www.amazon.com/Chasing-Light-Directing-Surviving-Midnight/dp/0358346231 (https://www.amazon.com/Chasing-Light-Directing-Surviving-Midnight/dp/0358346231)

I know some people don't like him but I actually do and I never knew he had a sense of humor (a good one too).

well i did finish Black notice (1999) but i haven't finished Deadly Decisions that for now is put aside.  i did finish one book though Centatur Aisle (1981) by Piers Anthony Book #4 in the Xanth series at the moment i dunno if i'm gonna finish it or not but i'm currently reading book #5 Ogre,Ogre (1982) again by Piers Anthony this one is one of my favorite books in the long extremely long Xanth Series.

Rev, do you know why that pic from The Omen is on there?

It's not his worst pick for Fifty Worst Films of All Time. He also picked "Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia," "Ivan the Terrible," and "Last Year in Marienbad."

You need to remember that, at the time it was released, most critics hated The Omen. Also, screenwriter David Seltzer wasn't especially proud of it. He is quoted to the effect that, while it was nice not having to worry about paying for groceries, he wished it happened with something he personally found more meaningful.

There are also five MST3K movies featured in it. They are Eegah, The Horror of Party Beach, Robot Monster, Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, and Swamp Diamonds (under the title Swamp Women).

I've been on a big comics/graphic novels kick of late thanks to my local library.

Just finished: The Rocketeer: The Complete Adventures by Dave Stevens

Currently reading:
Spider-Man Noir: The Complete Collection by David Hine, Roger Stern et. al.
...a cool "alternate timeline" Spidey collection set in the crime-ridden New York of the early 1930s. It's really quite clever how they managed to transplant Spidey and all of his supporting cast (Aunt May, J. Jonah Jameson, Norman Osborn, the Black Cat, etc.) into a totally different era and tweaked their back stories just enough to make it feel true to the time period. Neat stuff.

of that batch the only one to watch i think are Swamp women (1955) that one i think is a pretty good one at least when first watched it years ago and this wasn't the MSTK3000 version at that time i had no idea they even did that film at all or i had forgotten but i enjoyed it.

 :buggedout:

Wow, those are all pretty good films IMO.

Thanks: I didn't know that. The Omen was also banned in South Africa for a while.

One thing I think he did is just feature the worst movie from major directors: Hitchcock also gets in for "Jamaica Inn." It's really not a very good (bad) list. But it was the first of its kind. And the writing is snarky.

Ah, OK, I see.  :thumbup: He wrote another book about bad movies and he made mention of Inchon! (1982) and the lack of good food available in South Korea at the time, talking about the food staples of kimchi and barbecued dog, which he called "shish-ke-puppy"  :tongueout: :tongueout:

That one is The Hollywood Hall of Shame. It concerns movies that ended up with bloated budgets and weak box office performance. The authors acknowledge that not all of the movies they cover in it are bad (though the vast majority are).

i'm reading Ogre,Orgre Xanth #5 (1982) by Piers Anthony i'm about #120 pages or so into it

HITLER: ASCENT 1889-1939 by Volker Ullrich

The first volume of a two part biography of the 20th century's most infamous dictator contains some remarkable insights into Hitler's life and character.  A compelling read from start to finish!

I just finished reading Nancy Spannaus' book, HAMILTON VERSUS WALL STREET, and posted this review on Amazon:

Alexander Hamilton was an economic genius - friends and foes alike were dizzied by his understanding of all things related to finance and banking.  I, on the other hand, am emphatically NOT gifted in that way - I understand supply and demand, and the basic principles of mercantilism, but when you start juggling Keynes against Adam Smith and talking about interest rates, sinking funds, etc, etc, I get lost pretty quickly.
   "Well, then, Mister Author," you might say, "How do you KNOW Hamilton was an economic genius and not just a con man with a big vocabulary?"
    It's really very simple - Hamilton's ideas WORKED.  When Hamilton took office as the first Treasury Secretary, the USA was some $55 million in debt, with another $22 million in foreign debt owed by individual states.  The government had no stable source of income with which to meet its financial obligations, and Europe had effectively "cut up our credit cards."  But Hamilton's four-point plan - funding the debt at full value, assuming the foreign debt of the states, a series of excise taxes to establish a revenue stream, and a national bank to handle the nation's debts - were so effective that within a few short years American notes would carry in any bank in the world.  His "Report on Manufactures" encouraged the government to protect American industries and fund "internal improvements" - what we would call infrastructure today.  Hamilton's ideas launched America's national economy and placed it on a firm footing that survived his death, and his enemies' attempts to dismantle the systems he created.
   What Spannaus argues in HAMILTON VERSUS WALL STREET is that throughout American history, the country has experienced real substantive economic growth when it has followed Hamilton's ideas, and has suffered economically when it has abandoned them.  Far from being the "Father of Wall Street," as he is often hailed, she claims that Hamilton's plans were opposed to the predatory, profit-driven banking systems of today, while favoring a carefully controlled, growth-driven lending system that would expand prosperity for all citizens instead of lining the pockets of the rich while leaving Main Street USA to rot.  She also points out that many other nations have employed, and benefited from, Hamiltonian economic systems in the 217 years since Hamilton's life was cut short by Aaron Burr's pistol.  Lastly, Spannaus argues that a re-created Bank of the United States, dedicated to promoting economic growth and rebuilt infrastructure, would be a boon to the country today, lifting large segments of the population from poverty to prosperity, and rebuilding our crumbling national infrastructure.  Short, well-written, and easy to follow, Nancy Spannaus' book is a fascinating look at how the ideas of Alexander Hamilton are still applicable and beneficial today, even as they were in his own time.  An excellent read!

Lewis B. Smith, author of PRESIDENT HAMILTON: A NOVEL OF ALTERNATIVE HISTORY

well i finished Ogre, Ogre (1982) by Piers Anthony Book #5 in the Xanth Series and it's like the 3rd time i've read it and it's one of my favorites so of course i'm gonna give in a good rating.

The Chemistry of Powder & Explosives

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Jean Cocteau, "The Art of Cinema"

THE LAST ORACLE by James Rollins -

    Rollins' books are fun for anyone who likes adventure stories with a strong background in history, archeology, and legend.  His Sigma Force is a secret branch of the US Government that deals with threats all over the world.  This fast-paced story begins when a homeless man is gunned down, literally falling into the arms of Sigma's director Painter Crowe on the National Mall in Washington.  As he dies, he passes an ancient Greek coin with an odd inscription to Crowe, triggering an adventure that leaps from India's Taj Mahal to Chernobyl to the most polluted lake in Russia, with ties to the ancient oracle at Delphi, the origin of the Gypsies, and possibly ending in the destruction of humanity!   A fun read that was hard to put down.   4/5

wow i hadn't updated on what i read since Ogre, Ogre, i read 1st To Die by James Patterson (2001), 2nd Chance also by James Patterson (2002)  and now i'm reading 3rd Degree also by James Patterson (2004)

when i read a book i dunno about anyone else but sometimes the book can stay in my mind for awhile before i move on to something else and if it's a series those characters can be in my head for awhile and if they still are i just read another one in the Series. 1st To Die (2001) i had read before i want to say at least 2 times before but not in years. the 1st time was when it first came out in (2001) but i had started 2nd Chance (2002)  a few times but i never did finish it until a few days ago i started it over but i've never read any of the others as i prefer to read them in order

I ALONE CAN FIX IT: DONALD J. TRUMP'S CATASTROPHIC FINAL YEAR by Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker

  A powerful, well-researched, enthralling, and horrifying look inside the Trump White House, spanning from January 2020 to February 2021.  Based on hundreds of hours of interviews with White House staff, cabinet members, congressmen, senators, and Trump himself, two journalists outline the President's horrifically incompetent response to the COVID pandemic, his casual cruelty, and above all the psychotic self-centeredness of a leader utterly devoid of compassion and decency, a man who had to be repeatedly dissuaded from using the U.S. military against our own citizens, whose utter divorce from reality lead him to a brazen attempt to overthrow the U.S. government rather than admit the American people had rejected him.  I've been appalled by Donald Trump for decades, horrified by the thought that such a man could be elected to the nation's highest office, and puzzled as to why a third of the country still worships him when he should be rotting in jail for sedition.  Nothing in this book changed my mind - but sadly, it won't change theirs either.  Still, this one is a compelling read regardless of where you stand on the former President.  5/5

i just can't read a book about him all it does it just anger me cause of all the crap he did and how many deaths he caused for not doing a damn thing.

anyways on a whim i dunno if this happens to anyone but i was trying  to write a poem  and trying to think of some ideas when all it a sudden it hit me to watch a Harry Potter movie i think that's one of those series you love it or hate it but than you can say that about a lot of book series or hell film series.

anyways, so it being at the time too late to watch any of the films i picked up the last book Deathly Hallows (2007)  i've been reading the series since around early (2000) i think? i don't think the 1st film had even started filming at that time cause it was filmed that year but Goblet of Fire (2000) wasn't out yet and it wasn't even out yet so the newest one was Prisoner of Azkaban  (1999)  i know it's spelled wrong but i'm to damn lazy to look it up lol.

anyways in short i've been reading it since i was 21.   it was more really on a Lark i forget why i started he he anyways, i was almost #300  pages into it as it was and so i picked it up and i've been reading that ever since. i've still got over #400 pages to go i'm on page #350 i think? 

so it was quite easy to get back into the book all i needed to do was just start a chapter over that's all.

anyways, i was today and bought Blockade Billy  (2021)   it just came out and is Stephen King's new one in fact it just came out on i think the 3rd?  i may read that one i dunno just yet

The problem I see with a current book about Trump is that next week we will get some new revelation by a former staff member that should be on the book. The definitive book on Trump has still to be written.

"A Hedonist Manifesto" by Michel Onfray. Not that I need any convincing.

I'm reading a book called "Spillover" by David Quammen. It chronicles centuries of investigations about outbreaks such as Ebola, Lyme's disease and many others. Don't look for morbid descriptions of the infected here, but it is a very interesting read, especially in these times.

THE YEARS OF LYNDON JOHNSON: MEANS OF ASCENT by Robert Caro

This second volume of Caro's authoritative LBJ bio focuses on Johnson's years in Congress from 1941-48, especially on his turbulent campaign for the Democratic nomination for Texas' U.S. Senate seat in 1948, which culminated in LBJ winning by 87 votes turned in 6 days after the election was over from a single precinct in South Texas.  The flagrant theft of the nomination was aided and abetted by a Federal judge, who stopped an investigation on the literal day that the ballot box was to be open and the contested votes examined.  Johnson is on display in all his flawed glory in this book: His bravery during his one WW2 combat mission negated by his shameless lying about it afterwards, his utter lack of accomplishment as a member of Congress during the war, his willingness to be all things to all men in order to win, and his complete amorality in the pursuit of power.  Halfway through this massive undertaking, I will simply say this:  Caro's account of Johnson's life is one of the finest biographies I have ever read, period!

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New bathroom reading.

Finished Darkwalker On Moonshae which might be the best 'Dungeons & Dragons' story I've read (admittedly a lot of them I thought were quite poor).

I'm reading "Broken" by Don Winslow. It's a collection of short stories starring characters from his previous works. So you get to see again the characters from "Bobby Z" or "Savages" among others. The stories themselves are OK, they don't have the scope of his longer novels, but they're fun to read.

The Years of Lyndon Johnson: MASTER OF THE SENATE by Robert Caro

I read a LOT of biographies, but I will say that Robert Caro's magisterial series on LBJ is some of the finest biographical writing ever done.  Rich in detail and setting, Caro not only explains the complicated life and mixed record of Lyndon Johnson in lively and compelling detail, he also weaves in powerful portraits of the men who helped LBJ in his rise to power - Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn, Georgia Senator Richard Russell, and passionate liberal Hubert Humphrey, along with Presidents Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower, are all painted in bold and vibrant strokes.  Johnson, having stolen won the Texas democratic primary for Senate by 89 votes, finds in the Senate a place where he can put all his skills to use, and in record time he bypasses the rules of seniority that govern that tradition-heavy body to become Majority Leader - not only that, but to become the most powerful Majority Leader in history.  Despite standing with the "Solid South" in opposition to any and all civil rights legislation, he still managed, in 1958, to push the first civil rights bill into law in 75 years.  It was a weak law, to be sure, but it still broke the South's perfect record on blocking civil rights legislation and set the stage for the huge reforms of his Presidency. Indeed, it becomes clear as one follows Caro's narrative that Johnson's whole life was lived in ruthless pursuit of one goal - the Presidency.  "Power corrupts," the old sayin goes, but Caro makes it clear that power also reveals - how one uses power shows where one's heart is.  Johnson is a very complicated person, vile in many ways and admirable in others, and Caro paints him, warts and all, in one of the greatest biographies ever penned.  I've already jumped into the next volume, THE PASSAGE OF POWER.  Highly recommended, 5/5.

I lean more towards Frank Herbert's update of that chestnut, in it's more that power attracts the easily corrupted.

^agree with that. Also, ever notice how people overlook the "power corrupts" in favor of "absolute power..."?   people like to think a little bit of power is safe

I'm reading "What Paul Meant"

It's an analysis of the letters of Paul in the New Testament and tries to dispel some of what the author feels are myths about the famous apostle.

His main focus so far is to contrast the book of Acts with Paul himself and point out the differences. I hadn't really thought about it before, but it doesn't make tons of sense that while the Romans were the ones who had to put people to death because the pharisees didn't have that power, Saul was authorized not only to persecute Christians in Jerusalem but also somehow given authority to go to Syria and persecute those people.

In general the author prefers the letters to Luke/ acts

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Netflix sent me this paperback as a promotion for the movie adaptation they made. It's short and I'm probably going to see the film, so I'm giving it a whirl.

SAS: Band of brothers.

A true story of the capture of an SAS team inserted into occupied France to sabotage German defences and transport networks. They are tortured and eventually sent for execution on the direct orders of Hitler, but some of the team managed to survive and escape. The story then moves onto the hunt for the killers in the last days of WW2 and shortly after its end. It is one of a series of books on SAS/SOE operations and is a decent read, although not a completely riviting one so I am not sure if it would hold the attention of anyone who doesn't study the war.

I just finished reading VALLEY FORGE, a wonderful narrative of the Continental Army's darkest winter.  Here is the review I just left for it on Amazon.  Definitely worth adding to the library of any American Revolution historian:

"For those of us who grew up in the 70's, Valley Forge was synonymous with the suffering and dedication of the Continental Army during the darkest days of the Revolution - the images of barefoot, barely clad soldiers huddling in the snow, wasting away on a diet of firecake and water, as George Washington rode alone to a clearing and bowed before the Almighty, pleading with God to deliver his troops from the privations they were enduring - it was powerful stuff!  But how much of it was true?
   VALLEY FORGE is a powerful narrative, as well researched as a scholarly dissertation but as smoothly narrated as a brilliant novel, which shows that the truth about this dark winter of the Revolution not only encompassed but surpassed the clichés.  I have read many books about the American Revolution, but this was one of my favorites.  The familiar characters from our textbooks - the passionate, determined, dominating figure of George Washington, the young, idealistic aristocrat John Laurens, the ambitious and always competent Alexander Hamilton, the arrogant, scheming Horatio Gates, and the fiery Frenchman with an American soul, Marquis de Lafayette, all spring from the pages and into our minds in full glory.
   This is a must for anyone who collects stories of the Revolutionary War, and will take its place alongside such classics as 1776 and FOUNDING BROTHERS in the histories of this era.  Well done, sirs!

Lewis Ben Smith, author of PRESIDENT HAMILTON: A NOVEL OF ALTERNATIVE HISTORY"

I bought Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Book 1: a color combined edition of several TMNT comics. Not bad as I've never read any of the comics, ever until now.  :smile:

https://www.amazon.com/Teenage-Mutant-Ninja-Turtles-I/dp/0915419092 (https://www.amazon.com/Teenage-Mutant-Ninja-Turtles-I/dp/0915419092)

Atrocity Week by Andrew McCoy not for the easily offended.

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When I was with my friend the other day she gave me a novel called Daisy Jones and the Six about a fictional 1970s band, and said she'd just finished it, it was awesome and they were going to make a movie out of it, that it was Reese Witherspoon's absolutely favorite book of the century. She said I'd love it because it's set in the recent past and has a modern music/faux oral history vibe to it, and I do like reading oral histories.

I haven't finished it, maybe it picks up, but so far at the mid-point I gotta say this is one of the driest, flattest most uninspiring, most predictable, story-by-the-numbers books I've read in a while. It is like the author had a checklist she ticked off. Drugs, check, rehab, check, groupies, check, a Rolling Stone reporter following the group around, check, paternal manager who takes care of everyone, check, jealous wife, check, denim clothes, check, affairs within the band, check, ego-clashes between the singer and the band, check, angst about rock versus pop/rock versus disco, check. And somewhere in there there's no room left for any semblance of plot.

It's been a disappointment because it did sound promising.

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I picked "Indian Creek Chronicles: A Winter Alone in the Wilderness" by Pete Fromm in my local library. I've found travel books are a good break between my usual binges of crime novels.

The book is an account of a winter the author spent living in a tent in Idaho, while supervising a federal progream to reintroduce salmons into the wild. It's what you may expect of it, a light but insightful narration of his day to day and how he dealt with the problems he faced because of his own inexperience living in the wilderness.

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Hit Men: Power Brokers and Fast Money Inside the Music Business, by Fredric Dannen

The New Teen Titans Vol. 1 by Marv Wolfman, George Perez, and Romeo Tanghal

GUNS, GERMS, AND STEEL: THE FATES OF HUMAN SOCIETIES by Jared Diamond

Why did Europeans develop firearms, trans-Atlantic sailing vessels, and immunity (or at least healthy resistance) to deadly pandemic diseases like smallpox?
Why did the Chinese, who led the world in dozens of technologies between 1000-1400 AD, abandon many of those technologies in the next two centuries?
Why didn't native Americans develop simple technologies, like the wheel, or writing?
Why do some societies nurture invention and science, while others do not?

For centuries, the temptation has been to answer these questions by asserting that one race/tribe/nation is genetically or morally or intellectually superior to another. Jared Diamond argues that the real answer is determined by environmental issues, including the fertility of the soil, the presence of crops that can be cultivated and harvested to provide a constant, abundant supply of food, and the presence of large, domesticable animals that can supply both nutrition and "horse-power" to increase and multiply food production.

A bit dry in places, but impeccably well-researched, Diamond's book explores the reasons why some cultures flourish and develop, while others stagnate.  It provides a great deal of food for thought throughout, and I highly recommend it to any student of history!

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I've read scores of books about Medieval history, maybe even hundreds of books, it is the one period in human history that interests me above all others, but the most detestable, the most biased, the most agenda-driven book on the subject I've ever been exposed to is one that came out late last year called The Bright Ages, by David M. Perry.

It was bad history, bad reading, bad scholarship, and bad use of paper, ink, bandwidth, and time. Not only that but the writer is p***y-whipped by the university industrial complex's feminist mafia like no author I've ever read.

I think this is the worst book I have ever hated this much and still finished out of dogged masochistic loathing, and if I died tomorrow I would skip past Purgatory and ascend straight to Heaven, as all my sins are surely atoned for through the suffering that entered my assaulted eyes.

If ever there is a Geneva Convention for readers' rights, this book will be classified alongside mustard gas.

I'm going to start sniffing modeling glue to destroy the brain cells that remember encountering this loathsome war crime of a book.

Frances Farmer, save me a bunk in the mad house.

Quit being so ambiguous and tell us what you really think!!!

My favorite books on the Middle Ages are A DISTANT MIRROR by Barbara Tuchman, and another one called RICHARD AND JOHN: KINGS AT WAR.  I don't remember the author and I'm too lazy to go look it up right now.
But either of those might purge this horror from your brain.

I've read one of those; guess which?

I'll say A DISTANT MIRROR.

I've read The Gashlycrumb Tinies to my son as a bedtime story. He loves it.

And we have a winner!

Mysteries of Candlekeep.

D-Day Through German Eyes: How the Wehrmacht Lost France.

The Devil's Music: How Christians Inspired, Condemned, and Embraced Rock N Roll by Randall J. Stephens

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This will take a while.

My April list has included:

1491 - NEW VISIONS OF THE AMERICAS BEFORE COLUMBUS, which was an interesting look at Native cultures in North and South America in the years before the contact era.  I do think that some of the author's conclusions were pretty subjective, and much information it still unknown, but nonetheless this was a fascinating read.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND THE FIGHT FOR PEACE was an in-depth look at how Lincoln planned to put the country back together after the Civil War, with an analysis of what went wrong after his death, and a look at how some of his ideas were employed in the occupation of Germany and Japan after WW2.  A very well-researched and interesting book that was a great aid as I prepare to write my new alternative history about Lincoln.
FIRST MAN IN ROME - A repeat read of one of my favorite works of historical fiction, tracing the unlikely rise of Gaius Marius, the only man elected as Consul of Rome seven times (during the Republic), and his defeat of the German invaders and the demagogue Saturninus.  I think McCullough, more than any author I have ever read, gives us a real picture of what Rome was like in the final century of the Republic.
ISAAC'S STORM is a stirring account of the Galveston hurricane of 1900, well-written, stirring, and tragic.

Apostle - the author travels to all the sites of the alleged tombs of the apostles. https://www.amazon.com/Apostle-Travels-Among-Tombs-Twelve/dp/030727845X (https://www.amazon.com/Apostle-Travels-Among-Tombs-Twelve/dp/030727845X)


Some of these guys are easy to write about: Judas, Paul, John, etc others he has to dig a bit. Barnabus, for example, has 2 things known about him: one that he had the worst death of anyone: he was skinned alive, then also beheaded. There was a later "forbidden books" book where his physical description was described but it's probably not authentic. Basically the guy spends a lot of time in Greece and places like that talking to eastern Orthodox priests and/ or tour guides. A worthy project for sure!

yep i am  Cross Alex Cross #12 (2006) by James Patterson

I'm now listening to the second Jack Reacher book, Die Trying.  It seems like a pretty serious step down from the first one, which I read maybe 15 years ago.  Looking it up, many fans seem to consider the second the worst in the entire series.  Oh well, it's still passably entertaining. 

i''m now reading  The Last Precinct (2000) Kay Scerpetta #11  By Patricia Cornwell  honestly it's a decent book thus far but it's  Not going to be among my favorites as i'm on Page #281  which is nearly halfway done with it.  but who knows maybe that will Change

Looking for some bathroom reading, picked up the "Encyclopedia of Psychotronic Film." It'll be interesting to see how many of the movies I've seen since I last read it decades ago.

If you're talking about The Psychotronic Encyclopedia of Film by Michael Weldon, it's notable for being virtually the only resource from before MST3K to have mostly accurate information on Manos: The Hands of Fate.

The same. Before the internet you had to own multiple movie encyclopedias to read about movies you never thought you would ever get to see.

Thunderstruck by Erik Larson, a writer I respect, and a man I cannot like.

I'll just proceed with the assumption anyone reading this either knows what the book is about or will satisfy his curiosity by looking it up, and say that I found the chapters on Marconi and his experiments grew tedious, but the parts set in Edwardian England concerning the soon-to-be convicted wife-killer Dr. Crippen, American ex-pat and man of poor judgment, got more fascinating as they went on. (As I often thought about Michael Jackson and his conduct around young boys, Crippen left me wondering how anyone, guilty or otherwise, could be so dumb!)

There are also asides in this book about late-Victorian spiritualism, the deadly smogs of London, the cut-throat state of science at the time, and some nice descriptions that compel you to realize how utterly isolated those aboard ships were for most of history.

Like all of Larson's books, there's a lot of good information here amid the main plot and his many digressions and semi-parenthetical asides, and while at times your attention may seek to wander, or at least mine did, the trip to the end is worth it.

What has emerged since the 2006 publication of this book is that modern DNA evidence may suggest the infamous Dr. Crippen, long seen as one of criminal science's more intriguing and studied murderers, may have either have been innocent of his bullying wife's slaying and methodical dismemberment, or at least wrongly convicted based on the evidence that was presented in the Old Bailey, since in 2010, a century after the meek and soft-spoken Crippen was hanged after proclaiming his innocence to the end, tests conducted on stored tissues from the human remains found in Crippen's London cellar show no genetic match to his wife's living descendants, and in an even bigger bombshell, that the remains were those of a male!

Just who was it then buried under those bricks beneath the basement floor? Had Crippen killed previously? Did Scotland Yard plant evidence to assure a conviction in the face of public outcry? Was the previous owner of the house a killer, or perhaps a medical student who'd concealed the results of dissections? And how did anyone manage to remove every single bone from a dead human, leaving nothing but tissues behind, and yet present not a speck of blood anywhere in the premises?

And would someone capable of such precision really be so foolish as to put a body under his own floor and then repeatedly invite police in to search?

So did the mousy, hen-pecked physician do-in an overbearing wife who, it has to be said, repeatedly threatened to leave him and vanish back to America? Possibly, but if so he was condemned on bad Edwardian science and faulty evidence, poor man.

As to whether these modern discoveries are enough to merit the posthumous pardon Crippen's descendants seek, time will tell, but as for me I am left with a reasonable doubt about his guilt, though could go either way.

Anyway, Thunderstruck is slow in some parts as Larson's books tend to be, but all in all a good read for the history-minded.

I'm going to have to order that one!

I'm currently re-reading Colleen McCullough's THE OCTOBER HORSE, the next to last volume in her MASTERS OF ROME series, which accounts the last years of Julius Caesar's life, and the joint war of Octavian and Antony against Brutus, Cassius, Trebonius, and the other conspirators who murdered Caesar.
Like all of McCullough's Roman works, this book is meticulously researched and brilliantly written.
And, for the record, Cato was a total jerk, and Cicero a sanctimonious coward.  Just sayin'!

i'm currently reading The Bad Place By Dean Koontz (1990) and i'm only i think about #150 pages into it thus far and it's a slow start for those who haven't read it before it starts out with plenty of action and and i know i said a slow start but hear me out,  it starts out with s**t happening various things but it really feels like  Koontz starts you midway through the novel instead of explaining anything to you. so it took me a really long time to get into the novel.

and it still hasn't explained all that much, i do like the fact that one of the characters in it is a kid with Down syndrome i wonder since it came out what kind of reaction did koontz get? i mean he doesn't treat the character badly either.  has anyone read this one before? and if so what did they think of it?

He's someone I've never read, but I've been told he is a deft storyteller.

I read Koontz's "The bad place" years ago. I have to say that "Odd Thomas" apart I'm not a big fan of his work. His books have interesting concepts, but the prose is nothing to write home about, and his characters lack depth. I remember "The bad place" being more disgusting than scary, but having some interesting ideas thrown here and there. I can't say I liked it, but it kept me interested.

"Odd Thomas" is so different from his usual books that I kept wondering if he really wrote it.

i've read 1. the house of thunder (1982) that was really good until the end than it fell apart. 2. Strangers (1986) i loved this one and have read it a few times.
3. The Mask (1981) that one was f... awful it just stopped at the ending. i think he ran out of ideas my own opinion of course.  5. sole survivor (1997) i loved this one so much so that when it came out i gave to my mom to read and she loved it. and Cold Fire (1991) all i remember was that it had an awful ending.

i do think he's a good writer but not everything of his is good much like any author really with over #150 books there's bound to be plenty of bad ones in there at some point. so far i'm enjoying The Bad Place but though i'm only #180 pages into it and it is a lot i think better than "The Mask" to be fair

Just finished THE OCTOBER HORSE, Colleen McCullough's masterful account of the last years of Julius Caesar and the beginning of the power struggle between Octavian (Augustus) and Mark Antony.  Brilliantly told and compelling, the titans of the dying Republic stand tall in this book - Cicero, whose love of the Republic was never matched by an equal portion of courage or decisiveness, the incorruptible, stubborn, and self-righteous Cato, who would rather see the Republic destroyed than give Caesar anything at all, and Gaius Julius Caesar himself, standing taller than any of the petty little men who destroyed him, the greatest Roman who ever lived, ultimately killed by his own clemency and willingness to pardon those who made war on him.  Young Octavian emerges in these pages as Caesar's crafty, iron-willed young heir, a man who would build on Caesar's successes, capitalize on his name, and avoid his mistakes; and of course, Cleopatra, who loved Caesar as a foreign god-man worthy of siring an heir on the living goddess of Egypt she believed herself to be.   I don't know how many times I've read this series, but I enjoy the books each time I pick them up.  5/5

I started reading Heinlein's The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.  It's quite good so far.  If you've not read it, I'm finding it interesting as an OBVIOUS influence on The Expanse.  Worth tracking down I think.


I've not read this one, but I've noticed Koontz seems to have a soft spot for people with disabilities.  Several times they figure prominently in his stories and are usually morally virtuous, in comparison to "beautiful" people who are repulsive in a moral sense.  Sometimes it's a bit too much actually, with them being overly idealized if anything.  Some examples I can remember - From the Corner of His Eye, One Door Away From Heaven, and the Moonlight Bay books for instance.  One of the Moonlight Bay books in fact has a minor character with Downs syndrome. 

Some other trends from other Koontz books you see repeated - a house pet (usually a dog) that's considerably smarter than normal, conservative views about sexuality and negative depictions of those diverging from this (out of wedlock sex is often depicted negatively, I notice, though not always), weird religious/spiritual themes that are hard to specifically pin down, a character with a tragic, self-hating past that is redeemed by love in some manner. 

I should add - I've had very mixed opinions on his books.  Watchers is one of my all-time favorite books and I've read it multiple times, and I also quite enjoy both Moonlight Bay books (and still hold out hope he'll finish it, as it was supposed to be a trilogy), Intensity has one of the best written serial killers I can remember...  But I thought From the Corner of His eye and The Taking were just..  Bad.  Trite, really. 

reading a book called "When Christians were Jews" about the early Christians. It is mostly an excuse to cross examine the gospel authors re: their storyline, which is fine with me.

One point she makes is about Jesus turning over tables at the temple. His own parents sacrificed animals there and both he and Paul spoke well of it, so why was he mad? Also, why if Jesus was so popular did the people in the gospels hate him and choose some random criminal to be freed instead of him? and why did they even have a trial?

as you may know, I'm a big fan of this sort of stuff.

note: The author does believe that Jesus turned over tables in the temple but not because they were changing currency and so forth. Instead she thinks it was related to his belief that the temple would be destroyed, which it was 40 years later

She probably wouldn't sell many books if she just said: "Hey, these documents we have, many written by eyewitnesses, all within living memory of the events described, by men who gave their lives out of certainty that what they saw was true, are to be trusted."

she would be lying if she did that. gospels are all written 40+ years later by people living no where near the events that transpire.

Not at all. Pop Christian apologetics like you're describing are a MUCH, MUCH easier sell than a historical piece about Jews.  The built in audiences are slavering for more material, and are thus uncritical of the quality, just like with Christian films.  The Case For books have SIXTEEN entries and a feature film adaptation to date, for instance, they're raking in cash. 

I know you believe that, but it doesn't make it true.  The evidence for early dating of the Synoptic Gospels is FAR more convincing than the modern scholarly evidence that places them after 80 AD; while John was written later, in the 90's, the universal testimony of the early church is that John lived to an incredible old age (he even refers to this in the Gospel) and wrote his Gospel and epistles near the end of his life.

I will take the early attestation of men who were much closer to the events and in a far better position to know the truth over the speculations of 21st century "scholars" trying to sell books ANY day.

well, the gospels are very short and the writers , whoever they were, aren't around anymore so what do you do if you have a question about something?

Most people know that John, for example, has a different chain of events than the other 3 to some extent so how do you decide which is right?

This is what leads to these sort of books and ideas.


earlier dating is still long after 33 AD though

70 AD is often given as the date for Mark, the earliest one, because it seems to be shaped by the destruction of the temple of that era

"Because of the reference to the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE (Mark 13:2), most scholars believe that the Gospel of Mark was written sometime during the war between Rome and the Jews (66-74). Most early dates fall around 65 CE and most late dates fall around 75 CE. "

https://www.learnreligions.com/gospel-according-to-mark-248660 (https://www.learnreligions.com/gospel-according-to-mark-248660)

If you'd be interested to know why I believe the books of the new testament were written closer to an earlier time frame than a later one, I guess I could explain someday, but suffice to say that having read arguments for both viewpoints, I've found the case for the early dates has more to back it up. There was a time I roundly enjoyed reading authors who set out to undermine Christianity----not saying the writer you mentioned is trying to do that but many I used to like were----but the more I examined challenges to their scholarship, the more flawed I tended to find their arguments. I also resisted for a long while giving fair thought to those who wrote of evidence in support of conservative dating of the Gospels, yet to my annoyance I finally conceded to myself that these held water better than the humanists whose books I cheered on. I obviously don't know how much you've read by those who'd disagree with your conclusions but well-rounded study is often rewarding. Another thing I've noticed is historians seem to love to introduce new thought to old subjects, even when the past is by its nature unchangeable.

The stories themselves, of course, date back to the time when they happened, before and immediately after Jesus' death. Mark, for example, is said to be written by a traveling companion of Peter recording that apostle's memory of the events.

The stories existed and we assume were told before they were written down in the forms we know. There wouldn't have been much to the Christian faith from Jesus' time to decades later if no one had ever heard anything about Jesus' life or the things he said. Matthew didn't write a gospel in 80 ad and people were like "we've never heard these things before"


https://biblehub.com/luke/1-1.htm

"Many have undertaken to compose an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by the initial eyewitnesses and servants of the word.…"

The dating of the gospels is historians best guess with the clues they have. I reject the idea of "humanist vs conservative" dates

The Spoon River Anthology, one of my favorite works, which I try to read at least once a year. I think this might be my favorite narrator in the collection:

Margaret Fuller Slack

I would have been as great as George Eliot
But for an untoward fate.
For look at the photograph of me made by Penniwit,
Chin resting on hand, and deep-set eyes--
Gray, too, and far-searching.
But there was the old, old problem:
Should it be celibacy, matrimony or unchastity?
Then John Slack, the rich druggist, wooed me,
Luring me with the promise of leisure for my novel,
And I married him, giving birth to eight children,
And had no time to write.
It was all over with me, anyway,
When I ran the needle in my hand
While washing the baby's things,
And died from lock--jaw, an ironical death.
Hear me, ambitious souls,
Sex is the curse of life.


When I recited it to Daisy I told her to pay close attention to that last line. (I've found "Do as I say not as I did" is a great parental policy.)

The graphic novel Bowie: Stardust, Rayguns, and Moonage Daydreams

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowie:_Stardust,_Rayguns,_and_Moonage_Daydreams (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowie:_Stardust,_Rayguns,_and_Moonage_Daydreams)

Having produced three perfect books in a row, Amor Towles is America's greatest novelist so far in this century.

(https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/41q4p0O5wOL._SX326_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg)

I'm slowly reading a book about Lincoln that I am enjoying chapter by chapter.

https://www.amazon.com/Resurrecting-Easter-West-Original-Vision/dp/0062434187 (https://www.amazon.com/Resurrecting-Easter-West-Original-Vision/dp/0062434187)

unique book specifically about artistic depictions of The Resurrection. The moment Jesus is resurrected is not described in the gospels, yet is often depicted in both western and eastern art. William blake's resurrected hippy looking Jesus came to mind for me, but Eastern traditions show Jesus AND others, often Adam and Eve. It goes to the issue of what the resurrection means. The significance of the event in, say, Jewish Apocalyptic traditions and modern self help sort of theology are described very differently. perhaps at odds in some ways?

book is lavishly illustrated with images from paintings the authors saw mostly in Southern Europe.

JESUS AND HISTORY: HOW WE KNOW HIS LIFE AND CLAIMS by Steven Waterhouse

   I have always held that the Biblical Gospels are by far the best and earliest sources available for the life of the historical Jesus, and that they accurately describe his life and works.  But how early and how accurate are they?  Waterhouse lays out a logical, evidence-based case for dating the three Synoptic Gospels much earlier than most modern scholars give them credit for being, arguing that the three Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) were completed before 60 AD, and that while John's Gospel in its final form may indeed date to the last decade of the first century, some of the stories in it were likely written down much earlier.  He also talks extensively about non-Biblical historical references to Jesus and archeological discoveries that have confirmed  many details of the Gospel narratives.  All told, this book is a ringing defense against many of the modern criticisms of the Gospels from authors like Bart Ehrman and others.  Written in a simple, easy to follow format but with extensive footnotes and documentation, this is a great read for anyone interested in the origins of Christianity. 

Hitler's Battleships.

The story of the Kriegsmarine's doomed fleet and how even before Hitler's rise to power, the terms of the Treaty of Versailles were being ignored. Perhaps overly sympathetic to the German side, it is still an interesting history of the ships and the political manoeuvring around them and the inter-service bickering that led to them never being quite as effective as they might have been.

Got Lorenzo Silva's "El nombre de los nuestros" from the local library. I don't know if Silva has much stuff translated into English, but you should check him up. He's best known for his long running crime series starring investigators Bevilacqua and Chamorro, which have been made into a couple of films.

"El nombre de los nuestros" is a war / history novel about a few soldiers fighting in the Spanish colony of northern Morocco at the beginning of the first century. By then the territory was pretty much what was left of Spain's colonial empire, so politicians kept sending unexperienced, ill-equipped troops to fight the local insurgency, even if Spain's rule of the country was more theorical than practical. The main characters are the soldiers and officers of an unit sent to an isolated position to check the movements of the insurgents.

A series I heard about for the first time the other day is Dragon Precinct. Some of the descriptions I've seen include Dungeons & Dragnet and Hill Street Blues in Greyhawk. The Kindle are pretty inexpensive. So even if they do turn out to be bad, it won't have hit my wallet too hard.

From what I've gathered, Hitler and other Nazis were obsessed over battleships and what they could achieve with them. That was likely an outdated philosophy, very WWI-like. Because it was around that time when navies around the world tried to produce the bigger, more armored warships they could afford. By WWII however it was known they were very vulnerable to air strikes. For all the money Germany put in ships like the Bismarck or the Tirpitz, they didn't see much action and IIRC both were sunk by Allied air strikes.

If you are familiar with the concept of a 'Fleet in being', they would have still represented a large enough threat that would have caused large amounts of resources to be directed towards them even if they'd just sat in a port. The real danger of them was if they got out to run free in the Atlantic and would have ran rampant against supply ships and troop transports. Had Germany finished its two aircraft carriers, or the Luftwaffe provided support, they would have been much more dangerous, but yes by WW2 the age of the battleship was indeed over and doubtless the fuel and other resources they consumed could have been utilised to greater effect in other theatres. Oceanic warfare isn't really my forte though, maybe Indy could give us his opinion?

Yes, I think I've heard of the "Fleet in being" concept. It does make sense, especially in relatively confined space like the ocean between UK, Germany and Norway. You've made me think of the film "Sink the Bismarck!", that shows that indeed the Bismarck was an impediment to British tactics just by sitting there, and how important was to sink it, apart from the obvious propagandistic value of its destruction.

Ironic that Germany's biggest warship was named for Bismarck, who was against the development of a large navy. There's also the fact Wilhelm II spent years developing a world class navy he was so reluctant to use. He didn't want his toys damaged, I guess. The policy of the Royal Navy going into nearly the 20th century was to have twice as many ships as the next two largest navies combined, but in the age of industrialization this ideal became unsustainable as German shipyards were building warships so quickly there were even British planners, possibly in German pay, who showed it would have been cheaper for the British to let their warships be built in Germany. Obviously an unpopular idea but less insane than it sounded, as almost the instant a British ship was finalized on the drawing board, Germans already had every blueprint anyway, espionage being something the Germans have always been good at.

Just some thoughts.

Robert K. Massey's CASTLES OF STEEL was a really interesting read about the battleship competition that led to the Great War.

THE REGISTRATION by Madison Lawson

This girl was a former student of mine, and what a fine novelist she's become!   She's already got a movie deal for this one, which makes me proud and envious at the same time.  Here's what I wrote on Amazon:

THE REGISTRATION is a fast-paced, twisty, dark tale of America some seventy years after the Second Civil War.  Combining elements of THE PURGE movie series with the bleakness of DIVERGENT and THE HUNGER GAMES in an all-new recipe of dystopian stew, Madison Lawson's debut novel is impossible to put down!
   In the future, every U.S. citizen is granted the one-time right to "Register" someone.  Then the citizen has two weeks to track down and kill that person with no legal repercussions whatsoever - but if the person Registered survives those two weeks, they are home free - unless and until someone else Registers them. In the years since America nearly destroyed itself, the Registration has become the most cherished right of citizenship - and the basis of a new society, where the Oligarchs rule in conjunction with the wealthy Elysian family, who created the Registration.
   Enter Lynelle Mize.  Years after escaping her abusive stepfather Alan, she hears that he is re-marrying to a woman with two young daughters.  Determined to spare them the horrors she endured, she decides to finally use her Registration to kill Alan.  But then, while standing in line, she hears the man in front of her give the name of his own Registered victim - and it is her!  Lynelle escapes unseen, but now she has two weeks to elude the stranger who has used his one-time right to mark her for death.  And as she flees, she discovers he is not the only one who has Registered her!  Who are all these people that want her dead, and how can she escape them?
THE REGISTRATION is part chase story, part revenge tale, and part redemption arc.  Most of all, it's an exciting, pulse-pounding novel that will keep you up late at night as you try to finish it!  Kudos to this brilliant young author on an outstanding debut work of fiction. I can't wait to see what Madison Lawson writes next!

"The Usurper King" by Zeb Haradon

This was written before Trump's election and published in 2017, which shows you how far behind I am in my reading list. It's set in an alternate universe where Ted Bundy is running for President and a guy who reads animal entrails to tell the future is onto him. Self-published by my Internet friend, the director of ELEVATOR MOVIE.

(https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41KEZzSXRBS._SX331_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg).

About to start

(https://www.dukeupress.edu/Assets/Books/978-0-8223-4156-7_pr.jpg)

I loved elevator movie I've got to check that out


I'm reading Bad Blood about Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos. I would love a book on tape of her reading it in her fake deep voice

I finished Bad Blood. The middle part gets a bit repetitious, he milks the rise in alarming incidents a little too much, but in general it was quite good. Then again, my insomnia is back so my standards for reading material at 4 am are pretty low. Elizabeth Holmes is smart but spoiled and has no connection to people who make less than 500k a year. The author admits she's an amazing salesperson, but running a healthcare company is not a "fake it till you make it" situation and she broke many good and necessary laws. She is headed to prison in April for 11 years.

Why did she affect that deep voice anyway?

she denies that its fake so its hard to know the reason. it does give her a kind of otherworldly presence

Surrender, by Bono is a far better book than I expected it to be, a far better book than it should be. When he was messianic Bono could be insufferable; he's learned humility, and become sage.

(https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51LZz3BBqtL._SX329_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg)

Reading "Las cenizas del condor" by Fernando Butazzoni. It's a novel that delves in the 1970s dicatorships in South america through several personal stories, some set during those regimes and some years afterward. The bulk of the novel deals with a young woman who tries to escape from Chile to Argentina through the Andes.

http://strangehorizons.com/poetry/urban-legends-of-the-ohio-river/ (http://strangehorizons.com/poetry/urban-legends-of-the-ohio-river/)

Seems like something I'd write.

I'm reading Bart Ehrman's newest book, which sets it's sights on the book of Revelation.

Florida Man #1 by Mike Baron fun read.

Patti Smith's picture a day book.

So I finished "Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop." Both great, and depressing. The author's recipe for fixing American democracy is exhaustively researched, convincing, and simple: basically, adopt ranked-choice voting and increase the size of the House of Representatives (so more people and points of view can be represented). There's a little more detail to it, but the reforms would make third and fourth parties viable. The depressing part is he's cavalier about how to convince the Dems and Repubs to support anything that would end their duopoly on political power. Sure, he points out cases like New Zealand where public pressure forced parties to make electoral system concessions, but I don't see how the American public can break out of the "there's only two parties, one good and one evil, and you have to support the good one with every trick at your disposal" mindset that the two parties feed them.

Anyway, I'll be starting "Ovid's Metamorphoses" next.

I finished Bart Ehrman's "Armageddon", about the Book of Revelation. I agree with him that it doesn't have a lot to do with what Jesus taught and has been reduced to a Nostradamus type future prognostications puzzle. Form wise though, it does work pretty well as a final Bible chapter. 5/5

A couple of months ago I picked up a copy of the complete works of Julius Caesar (Landmark Edition).  As I started to read it this week, I am once more amazed at the miraculous nature of the written word.  Here I am, reading the (translated) thoughts of a mind that was snuffed out nearly a century before the first books of the New Testament were written.  Caesar's words, scribbled on papyrus scrolls by the flickering lamplight inside his command tent somewhere in France, and carried by horseback to Rome to be copied, live on twenty centuries later, emblazoning the images and events that he saw onto my mind.  All through the miraculous, mundane, marvelous power of these things we call BOOKS!

i have no desire to read that as it's not the type of thing i normally would read but you are right though i do hope you enjoy it my friend. i'm reading one called Blind Sighted  (2001) by Karin Slaughter and yes that's her real name it really fits too since she writes mystery.   anyways i have heard of her in the past few years but i never had read her before than the tv show Will Trent came on early this year and i fell in love with it and than i saw at wallmart the 1st book in that series so i bought it and i'm glad i did haven't seen it since.

no doubt it was sold out really quick due to the show being a hit as it thankfully got renewed for a 2nd season.   anyways, i belong to good reads and i was looking up just reviews of the book and i came across one that someone had posted and said if you read her you need to start with the Grant County series and there's like 5 or 6 of them in all.  the reason being is they later have some characters go into the will trent series which is her main one i think so why not? so i downloaded it the 1st book and i'm already 56% into it on Chapter 16 it's pretty damn good i think and she can be graphic when talking about the dead bodies found. if you decide to read her be warned

Biblical by Rob Halford (Judas Priest)

Arthur Vandenberg: The Man in the Middle of the American Century.

Would that we had such a consensus-building politician in our time.

NAKED STATUES, FAT GLADIATORS, AND WAR ELEPHANTS - Frequently Asked Questions about the Ancient Greeks and Romans by Garret Ryan

   One of my formers students gave me this book as a gift, and it's quite a remarkable read!  I know a good bit about the ancient world, but this book contained a few surprises, and more detail about things I already was aware of.  An excellent read for anyone with a professional or casual interest in the history of the ancient world.

I just finished Quentin Tarantino's book, Cinema Speculation.  It's a sort of combination of film essays and reminiscence of his childhood watching huge numbers of 70s films in various theatres.  Gives you a good idea why his film taste and writing/directorial style is the way it is. Some of the essays get too bogged down in lists of films (Quentin has unbelievable film knowledge, it's obvious) or just were titles that didn't connect with me personally, but there's still a lot of good insights and analysis here, often of films that are less likely to get it.  There's also comparisons of scripted versions VS the final shooting version, and a couple of postulated what ifs (like what if Brian DePalma hadn't passed on Taxi Driver).  I also like Tarantino being willing to knock directors he clearly quite likes and respects - like Scorsese claiming to be "shocked" about how people reacted to the ending of Taxi Driver.  Well worth a read!


Love books like this one, and I've never heard of it!  Added it to my list.

Superman's Greatest Team-Ups - a collection of highlights from the DC Comics Presents title of the '70s and '80s which paired Superman with a different character each month.

I was somewhere the other day where there was NOTHING to read but a book called Child Bride: The Untold Story of Priscilla Beaulieu Presley, which basically trashed Priscilla Presley, making the case that she lied to Elvis, stalked him, misrepresented herself, cheated on him, and took every advantage of him she could, stealing him blind while they were wed, then stomped on Elvis' family after his death (she was his ex-wife, remember, not his widow) and got control of his estate via her minor daughter., cutting Elvis' family out of almost everything whenever she could. In short she is painted as a soap opera-level manipulator and villain who slept and schemed her way to the top, landing the big prize she'd been ruthlessly pursuing for years, and then hurting a generous man who truly loved her and from whom she hid her true nature.

Who knows?

Imperial Bedrooms by Bret Easton Ellis.

It's the sequel book to his mid-80s book Less Than Zero.

An Hour Before Daylight, Jimmy Carter's memoir of his boyhood years. It's delightful.

(https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41tAGtg+Z9L._SX498_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg)

Victoria's Daughters, by Jerrold M. Packard. Explores the lives of Queen Victoria's many daughters, especially the ones less well-known to history.

AMERICAN CAESAR: General Douglas MacArthur by William Manchester

I have had this book for many years and read it as a teen/twentysomething, but I picked it up for a re-read near the end of this school year and deeply enjoyed it. MacArthur was an incredibly complex man who inspired passionate devotion in some and passionate loathing in others, but his accomplishments are many and genuine - not the least of which was taking the most militant nation on earth and transforming it into a pacifist democracy during his six years as the Supreme Authority over occupied Japan.   Fantastic book!!!

New bathroom reading...

(https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/711-iu8m85L.jpg)

The London Seance Society is a disappointing, misrepresented, shallow book, and I regret the time I put into it.

THE EISENHOWER CHRONICLES by Michael Zucker is a very well-done, carefully researched biographical novel about Dwight Eisenhower, the architect of the Allied victory in Europe and America's 34th President.  Told in a series of vignettes, the story begins with Ike as a frustrated colonel in the Philippines reading about Kristallknacht in Germany, and ends with him as a retired former President, advising Kennedy on how to handle the Cuban Missile Crisis.  Engaging and entertaining, but still historically accurate, this book does much to explain why historians rank Eisenhower in the top 5 of American Presidents.

(https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71MZccBGlbL.jpg)

Dove into a couple chapters of this because I'm going to interview the author--but it's almost 700 pages on ROBOT MONSTER!!  :buggedout:

THE POPE AND MUSSOLINI by David Kertzer

Drawing extensively on Italian government archives and the Vatican's own records, this is a fascinating history of the people and idea's that drove Pope Pius XI to sign the famous Vatican Concordat with Italy's fascist dictator.   Pius and Mussolini's alliance was an uneasy one - neither man liked or trusted the other, but Mussolini wanted the support of the Catholic Church, and the Pope wanted legislation that woud make Italy a confessional state again, rathre than a secular one.  But as Mussolini drew increasingly close to Hitler, and adopted anti-Semitic legislation to please his German ally, the Pope became more and more uncomfortable with the alliance and was preparing a powerful anti-fascist encyclical that was suppressed by his successor, Pius XII, after his death.

So many parallels in this story to the politics of today - religious figures embracing a man whose life constantly echoed his contempt for their dearest beliefs, in hopes that he would save them from socialism/communism, and a cynical, godless politician paying lip service to religion in order to garner popular support.  A tale as old as time, but people still fall for it.

A highly recommended read!!

If you wanna take up bulimia, this book will help you achieve your regurgiatory goal.

The Future of Rock & Roll, by Robin James.

I grew up listening to the greatest independent modern rock station in the country, 97X, hearing bands I would never have known of had I cut my teeth on cut 'n paste corporate FM channels, and was thrilled to find out someone had written a book about the station, but the trouble was...someone hadn't.

I guess I should have had a clue what I was in for when the author described herself as a professional philosopher----yeah, I laughed too---because the book really isn't a history of 97X so much as about the writer's views on how much she hates capitalism, conservatism, traditions, anything basically but nihilistic communalism. Oh, and victims. She loves victims.

She even spends a puzzlingly large amount of ink attacking Margaret Thatcher (though she grew up in the Midwest after Thatcher was out of office) and Republicans and churches and law enforcement and businesses and anyone who has a thought independent of her own sheltered little enclave, and once in a while drifts back to talking about the station, though almost exclusively through the lens how how the big evil mean world victimized it. (Uh....)

I barely got through its 150 or so pages and felt like I'd just come out of a long joyless Puritanical sermon. Ever listened to a humorless woke warrior, cynical and jealous, tell you what's wrong with the world and nothing you can say will change them from their beloved subject? This was that in book form. The idiots at FOX News have opposites, and this author was one. Frodo Baggins come save us from this darkness.

Maybe someday someone will actually write a history of a station that lived by its own rules and made America great in its own way, one magnificent song at a time.

Jamestown: The Truth Revealed.

Our hard-pressed, starving forebears at the first permanent English settlement in the present-day United States endured terrible suffering and even resorted to cannibalism to stay alive.

Forget Clive Barker, for true horror study history!

Couldn't put this book down. Read it in one day.

That sounds like a dandy!!!!

Reading one you might be interested in Indy, if you haven't yet.

I'm reading Heavenly Bodies: Cult Treasures and Spectacular Saints from the Catacombs.  It's a collection of history, stories and high quality color plate photographs of the various catacomb saints from the 16th and 17th century in Europe.  These are  skeletons of Christians who died in the early Roman era (300-400 AD range), and then were moved and decorated in that time frame.  At some point, the Catholic church became embarrassed about them and most were either hidden or destroyed, so it took a long time for them to be documented and photographed.  In general, it's quite interesting, the photographs are excellent, and the saints are often pretty amazing works of art - it's obvious immense effort and dedication went into them. 

My favorite I've seen is St. Pancratius
(https://i.imgur.com/Qu2qiOL.png)

DESTINED TO BE A HAMILTON: TRUE LIFE STORIES OF MARY ANNE HAMILTON, GREAT-GREAT-GRANDDAUGHTER-IN-LAW OF U.S. FOUNDING FATHER ALEXANDER HAMILTON by Mary-Anne Hamilton and Helena Reynolds

I met Mary-Anne Hamilton two years ago, shortly before my alternative history novel PRESIDENT HAMILTON was published. She was very enthusiastic about my book, since it dovetailed with her mission as a Hamilton advocate - to remember and celebrate the life of America's "ten dollar Founding Father." As we got to know each other better and she shared her remarkable biography with me, I told her she needed to write her story down for future generations. At one point she even asked me to help her organize and edit her memoir, but I was already hip-deep in my next novel and had to defer.
Helena Reynolds stepped into the gap magnificently, and helped Mary-Anne edit and arrange her life story. The result is this book. Whether your interest is in Alexander Hamilton specifically, or the Hamilton family, or just American history in general, I think you will find this story a delightful read. Lavishly illustrated with family photographs, this book tells the story of a 31 year old divorcee who married a man 34 years older than herself - the great-great grandson of Alexander Hamilton and the grandson of famed financier and "robber baron" J.P. Morgan, Laurens Morgan Hamilton! Mary-Anne describes in sprightly detail how she came to appreciate her husband's life-long effort to restore the reputation of America's first Treasury Secretary, long-maligned and slandered by his enemies, nearly all of whom survived him by decades. After seeing the Broadway musical HAMILTON and meeting Lin-Manuel Miranda, Mary-Anne revived her husband's work with a vengeance. Joining forces with Rand Scholet, the founder of the Alexander Hamilton Awareness Society, she traveled all over America and the Caribbean, speaking about Hamilton and his remarkable contributions to our country.
From 15 year-old unwed mother to champion of one of America's Founders, Mary-Anne's story is an entertaining and inspiring read! After watching her publish her first book at age 89, I will admit I find myself wondering what this remarkable old lady is going to do next. (I'm thinking either skydiving or maybe swimming the English channel?) Anyway, this is a great book. Get yourself a copy today!

How Jesus Became God by Bart Ehrman - There was 10 minutes left until library closed so I grabbed this and a John Le Carre novel. I've read a bunch of Ehrman's book and I like this one so far. How can a preacher from rural Galilee end up being thought of as God in human form? Is he really the "Son of God" or is it more like how Hercules' Dad was Zeus and his mother was a human, or how Roman Emperor's were worshiped as Gods yadda yadda. I believe in God but I've never understood the supernatural aspects of any of the major religions. Can't I just say "Yeah I think animal sacrifices are weird and that we should treat even the worst people well" and not have to believe in some miraculous act I never myself saw. Apparently not

Our library no longer does late fees so I can read these without having to re check them out 5 times.

The thing I've found in Ehrman's scholarship and assertions is they don't stand up well against vetting, and even something as shallow as a rebuttal on YouTube is usually enough to undermine most of the theories he expands into entire books. He's someone who gets taken more seriously than I think he deserves.

But then again I find it's the conservative theological scholars whose work bears up to the deepest scrutiny, despite their being little glam in their message. Iconoclasts tend to grab the headlines.

have you ever read any of his stuff?

Years ago, Lester, I read one called Misquoting Jesus, and felt two things. One was a spitefully immature: "Ha, good, I hope he upsets fundamentalists!"

The other was surprise that he was getting away with the leaps of conjecture he was passing off as hard scholarship, because I'm not sure most of my professors would have let us get away with so much speculation dressed up as solid fact, and we were undergraduates.

Don't ask me for specific citations, please, it was about twenty years ago and I no longer have the book, only recall that being my feeling.

I think he is coasting on sensation and a sense in too many people that Christianity cannot stand on its own claims, which it can.

bah

I thought you might find this interesting, lester.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8enwoGIas8 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8enwoGIas8)

ER - it confirms that the places that Paul and Luke visited existed, but I've never heard anyone challenge that they went places and saw things. To say that it "confirms the Book of Acts" implies that therefore everything in the Book of Acts, like the prison somehow falling down around but not on the group and their chains became magically unfastened, is accurate.

I have no doubt Jesus, Paul, and Luke were all real historical figures.

Since you read about that era I just thought you might think the archaeology was interesting.

A Haunting on the Hill, by Elizabeth Hand.

This authorized (yeah, by whom?) so-called return to Shirley Jackson's Hill House is a mess! It reminds me its author took a pre-existing manuscript about a writer and her friends and stuck it into the setting of her idea of a version of Hill House, because it reads like two entirely different books, neither good, neither connected.

This isn't Hill House by any stretch of the imagination!

(https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51q7dhca+IL._SY445_SX342_.jpg)

Written about 1000 AD, it's sometimes called the first novel (though it wasn't).

I've only read a few books this year, but in my defense one was 600 pages of difficult Ovid, and one was 600 pages on "Robot Monster." This one is 1000 pages (!)

^ If you can finish it, you've bested my efforts. I finally finished The Aeneid after twenty-some years.

I read about half the Aeneid in college (assigned) and came back and finished it a couple of years ago, so I'm in a similar boat. I'm working my way chronologically through one of those "greatest works of world literature" lists. Completing it is a bucket list item. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bokklubben_World_Library

I finished "How Jesus Became God" it was incredible. I've never understood how Jesus became God but now I sort of do.

So the other day I was at the public library’s used bookstore and spotted a horror anthology on display. I picked it up and glanced through the table of contents, which listed a bunch of the usual suspects. Robert Bloch, Bram Stoker, Edgar Allan Poe, H.P. Lovecraft, Richard Matheson, and so on. But one startling inclusion was Damon Runyon. In this case, it was an early short story entitled “The Informal Execution of Soupbone Pew”. It features some petty hoods with colorful sobriquets as you might expect from Runyon. But something which might shock and terrify regular Runyon readers is the slew of contractions.

Also rereading "The Psychotronic Video Guide"

:lookingup:
lester, you're a well-read fellow with an admirably questioning mind, though why you habitually place greater stock in someone telling what he thinks he knows about the source material than the source material itself has never made sense to me.

Besides, a miracle by its nature does not lend itself to explanation. A miracle defies explanation by simply being what it is. You're not going to ever find someone who can supply a rational formula to an irrational occurrence.

The strongest evidence suggests Jesus did not become God, Jesus was God. People did not need to deify Jesus in later ages since from the 30s AD Jesus was already known as what he was.

I still say if you're not going to go straight to the source and avail yourself of the testimony of actual eyewitnesses, you should take time to read from the other direction and see what some writers outside your comfort zone have to say. It might defy your expectations.

Though....

"A miracle defies explanation by simply being what it is" that is entirely his point. It's a matter of faith, not logic.

Rev- I liked Psychotronic but man it had a lot of spoilers. I would have to weirdly skim each issue

https://www.amazon.com/Tsarina-Ellen-Alpsten/dp/1250214432 (https://www.amazon.com/Tsarina-Ellen-Alpsten/dp/1250214432)


it's good

Brave New World by Huxley.

Ever read her autobiography?

The Book of Job

(Thank you, Good Omens 2...)

Er - no I watched some Russian series about Catherine the great though

(https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61y04z8SKEL._SL350_.jpg)

I'm skeptical.

Troop Leader - A Tank Commanders Story by Bill Bellamy.

The Narrow Road to the Deep North, by Basho. A journey across Honshu in the 17th century is described by Japan's great poet in this intimate and detailed travelogue. I enjoyed reading this!


Koresh, by Stephan Talty.  Marking the upcoming thirty-year anniversary of the Branch-Davidian conflagration in Waco, Texas, this grim and difficult to process book tells a long story about its title character, his strange delusion-filled life of increasing megalomania, and the suicides of (and more commonly the mass murders of) his followers. I think this is a very fair investigation into an unpleasant subject which still fascinates today, and it serves to show in some detail that while the government forces did make errors, they were throughout the siege and in the raid before it, the good guys, who were in the right in their actions, and in no way caused the fire that ended the standoff. (Spoiler: Davidian fanatics inside the buildings set the fire because they believed the FBI was entering the compound, and so they sought to burn them to death, and also shot and murdered dozens of their fellow faithful, including many children.) A hard book to read because its subject is so awful.

My friend brought over an Avengers hardback edition book. And a history of WWE Smackdown.

I've also been reading The Essential Doctor Strange Volume 3

"Going Clear" It's about Scientology which is worse than I thought it was. Its basically a celebrity cult and non celebrities could well end up living in a weird base somewhere making 30 dollars a day. They also harass people who try to leave and are essentially their own communist government to their brainwashed members.

SANTA ANNA OF MEXICO by Will Fowler

   I have taught Texas history for over 25 years now, and I've studied Santa Anna's conflicts with Texas pretty closely.  But I didn't know much about him beyond that, nor why he was so popular with the people of Mexico that he wound up serving as President no less than six times (or 11, according to some counts - he often took long breaks from the capital while serving as President).  This was an interesting, informative look at the life of the man who was considered a founder of the Republic, who was a brave general on the battlefield but also guilty of extreme arrogance and incompetence; whose political ideology veered back and for from Federalist to Centralist to monarchist.   Unlike many Latin American dictators, Santa Anna outlived his times, his many terms of office, survived being tried for treason, and finally died of old age in relative poverty and obscurity at the age of 82.  Overall, an excellent read!  4/5