Reading anything?

[lester1/2jr]

^ a cool and also small book on a similar topic is "there are no secrets" about the great tai chi guy chen man ching

and I'm rereading "Everyone's asking who I was" it's a compilation of crazy quotes a guy working at an old folks home compiled.

[Allhallowsday]

I'm rereading Severed The True Story of the Black Dahlia 

[AndyC]

Finished Bed of Nails. Pretty good book. The second half had more of a focus on the Cook Islands and their cannibal history, with the climax taking place there. The killer's agenda involves indulging in some old-school cannibalism, going as far as to lure the intended victim to the appropriate setting. One of the things I liked about this book is that it is one of only two or three Special X thrillers that revolve almost entirely around Insp. Zinc Chandler. Of all the recurring characters, he's the one most likely to engage in a high-speed chase, nearly get himself killed and score some tail, usually in the same book.

With only one Slade book left in the series, I'm going to take a break from Special X. Just started Peter Straub's Koko, based on a recommendation from Circus a while back. Looks good so far, although switching authors after reading the same one for several books in a row always requires a little time to shift gears. Takes me a couple of chapters to get used to a different style of writing.

[Psycho Circus]

Just started Peter Straub's Koko, based on a recommendation from Circus a while back.

So, you've finally got round to it after you're Michael Slade marathon. I actually read Koko again last week, still the best novel I've ever ploughed through. 

Just finished reading this:


The former guitar player of failed Sunset Strip band Onyxx recalls his wild days as a 16 year old rockstar. Totally my kind of read, short and sweet, packed full of hair metal madness and embarressing memories.

[InformationGeek]

52 Vol. 1-4: After the events of Infinite Crisis, all DC comics jumped ahead one year in comics.  So what happened during that odd and missing year?  Well this comic breaks down what happened every week from the rise of the Religion of Crime, the cult of Superboy, Lex Luther's Everyman Project, to return of the Multiverse.  It is one of the most interesting and well put together stories I have ever read.  Of course four of my favorite writers were in on the story: Mark Waid (Kingdom Come), Grant Morrison (All Star Superman), Greg Rucka (Gotham Central), and Geoff Johns (Green Lantern: Rebirth).

The Killing Joke: The short comic by Alan Moore about the possible origin of the Joker and his quest to drive Comissioner Gordon insane.  To sum it up in one word: Wow

[indianasmith]

This week I finished two books:

THE CRUSADER: RONALD REAGAN AND THE FALL OF COMMUNISM by Paul Kengor

Using many recently declassified documents from the 1980's and earlier, the author shows how the fall of the Iron Curtain on Reagan's watch was no accident of history but rather the result of a policy that Reagan was formulating as far back as the early 1960's.   Reagan's lifelong hatred of Communism was based on two things: its militant atheism, which stood opposed to his own Christian faith and the Judeo-Christian principles he believed to be the bedrock of Western Civilization, and its cruel denial of human rights, something he witnessed firsthand on a visit to East Germany in 1978.  I make no bones about believing that Reagan was the greatest President of my lifetime, and this book confirmed a lot of things I've suspected for years about Reagan, with very heavy documentation and use of primary sources to back it up.

WORLD WITHOUT END by Ken Follett.  This is the long awaited sequel to THE PILLARS OF THE EARTH, his epic tale of the building of Kingsbridge Cathedral in  12th century  England.  Set in the same village, and beginning about 150 years later, it describes a sworl of events that started when four children from Kingsbridge witness a swordfight between a weary, wounded knight and two men-at-arms.  It spans the beginning of the 100 Years' War and the devastation of the Bubonic Plague.  While not as original or compelling as PILLARS, it was still a very entertaining read.  I devoured its 1000 pages in three days!

[Sleepyskull]

Dracula by Bram Stoker

Only about 30 pages in, it's pretty good so far!

[InformationGeek]

Once again, I continue through my comic books checked out from the library and here's where I am now:

Nightwing: Year One
Green Lantern Corps: Recharge
Batman: Haunted Knight
Superman: Secret Identity (If you can find a copy, it is an aboslute must read!)
Ultimate Spider-Man: Ultimate Collection Vol. 1
Batman: Year One (A must read for any Batman fan!)

Next up to read: Batman R.I.P.!

[BTM]

I just got done reading the first two books in the Aleron Codex series by Jim Butcher.  It's a pretty good series!  It's a fantasy story set in a world where people can control various elementals (called Furies).  It's sort of like Avatar The Last Airbender.  I highly recommend it.  

I also recommend Butcher's other series The Dresden Files.

[Rev. Powell]

KWAIDAN: The collection of Japanese ghost stories on which the movie was based.  I'm going to see the film after I've read the stories first.

[Fausto]

Voodoo: Strange Tales and Fascinating Lore, edited by John Richard Stephens. In the intro, the editor does a good job of sorting out the facts and rumors surrounding voodoo (along with other African diasporic religions), and then the stories (including those by Robert Louis Stevenson, H  Rider Haggard, and HG Wells, among others) take all the misinformation and run with it.

[Vik]

[lester1/2jr]

 I started but got bored with "crunchy cons" which is a book about the "alternative" right: republicans who are into organic food co ops and paying lip service to various ideas you think of as left wing like the evironment and ...you know good wines and stuff.

It's a good phenomenon but not one I am a part of. I hate vegatables organic or regular and don't really hae any ethical concerns with anything.

So I started rereading "the discovery of freedom" by rose wilder lane. I'ts one of my favorite books. Basically, her  belief is what we know as progressive is actually very regressive and doesn't look to the future but back to our ancient pagan past where we worshipped inumerable gods and believed heavily in fate and predestination.  

It was written in he 40's and it's interesting because it's right when the government was starting to become huge and she was cautioning people that you know, it wasn' long ago when we had no sort of free market and great populations of people starved to death and their were eras when really nothing of interest happened because everyone was so paranoid about offending the various gods.  No one listened to her of course.

Her mother was Laura Ingalls Wilder and she actually sort of ghost wrote alot of the Little House books

[indianasmith]

I just read WORLD WAR Z again today.  Awesome book, kind of like what might have happened if ALL Romero's zombie flicks came true at once.  Max Brooks is a genius.

[ChaosTheory]

AMERICAN ON PURPOSE by Craig Ferguson.  Plenty of sordid stuff, like any entertainer's memoirs, but also very wry and funny.