New! Reading Anything Thread 2.0

[lester1/2jr]

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

[Rev. Powell]

I'm skeptical.

[Alex]

Troop Leader - A Tank Commanders Story by Bill Bellamy.

[ER]

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.

[HappyGilmore]

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

[lester1/2jr]

"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.

[indianasmith]

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