What Books Are You Reading?-#3

Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

I am currently reading "Carrion Comfort" by Dan Simmons about "mind vampires" who can make other people do whatever they want them to do. It's sort of a horror/sci fi/thriller with some politics and some movie business stuff thrown in there as well. It's a bit more cerebral than your average "horror" novel, I guess. I was lured in by the quote from Stephen King on the cover saying that it is "one of the three greatest horror novels of the twentieth century" and Guillermo del Toro raving about it as well. I'm not that far in, but so far it's interesting.

I finally finished "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo", and while I enjoyed it, I'm not in any rush to read the second one. It was decent, but nothing groundbreaking in my opinion. What was most interesting to me was the Swedish background, although I'm sure as a North American reading it in English, I would have missed a lot of the more interesting Swedish-isms that would have been in the original.
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

I'm reading 'The Likeness' by Tana French. It's set in Ireland and features Detective Cassie Maddox who was in French's previous novel 'In the Woods'. In 'The Likeness', Cassie is still dealing with the fallout of what happened in 'In the Woods'. She's transferred from Murder into Domestic Violence, and is seeing Detective Sam O' Neil who was also in 'In the Woods'.
She gets called to a crime scene by Frank Mackey, her former mentor, who works in Undercover where Cassie worked before she moved over to Murder. The victim is a young woman named Lexie Madison - a name which is all too familiar to Cassie and Frank - it's the alias Cassie used on an undercover op years before. Even creepier, the young woman looks exactly like Cassie. Frank Mackey comes up with the idea of claiming that 'Lexie Madison' wasn't murdered, but just the victim of an attack, and to send Cassie undercover as 'Lexie' to draw out her killer.

I'm enjoying it so far. French's novels are crime, but they're very character centric and psychological, which I love.
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

^ the modernity book sounds interesting, and so does 'the likeness'.

i finished blacklands (and quite liked it) and now i'm reading 'the devil's feather' by minette walters on my kindle. i like her books generally, and it's quite good so far, but a little confusing (but her books always are!)
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

^I really enjoyed The Likeness. What I really liked is that although it's a crime/thriller, it's very much a psychological, character-based novel. When I say 'psychological' I don't mean like Jonathan Kellerman, it's not really a 'really bad criminal commits really bad/odd crimes and is pursued by the detectives case' novel, it's psychological in that it seems to really get inside the head of the main character, Cassie, and deal with issues of identity and family and belonging. Once she is sent undercover as 'Lexie' she finds herself becoming increasingly drawn into Lexie's odd group of four friends who live in a house together and shun the rest of society pretty much, and who have their own share of secrets.
I'd definitely recommend it, it's quite dark and deals with some heavy stuff but it's intriguing and as I said, very much character-driven rather than plot-driven, which I like.
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

^ *goes to kindlestore*

i just finished "the devil's feather" by minette walters on my kindle - it wasn't as good as some as her others i thought, generally as a writer i really like her, but this one was kind of different from her usual ones and i didn't like it as much. it was still not bad though.
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

Contemplating on whether I should start reading Les Mis again. It's the unabridged version so...it's pretty thick. It's a great story but I just can't finish it. All the details about France is just a bit much.
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

^^^ I felt that way about Anna Karenina. :lol: It is interesting to get a slice of Russian life in that era, but after a while it can get to be a bit overwhelming.
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

i just finished "Dead in the Family" by Charlaine Harris. it was pretty good but it was too short for me. i finished it in a day! i just love these Sookie Stackhouse Novels. i'm a fan of the show too, and i think so far they go great together.
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

AFIS said:
Contemplating on whether I should start reading Les Mis again. It's the unabridged version so...it's pretty thick. It's a great story but I just can't finish it. All the details about France is just a bit much.
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do it do it do it do it do it do it do it do it do it do it do it do it do it do it do it do it!!!!!!!!! i really can't stress that enough.

i put off reading les mis for a long time for similar reasons and i wish i hadn't. it's one of the single most incredible, fantastic books i've ever read and i loved every single page. it is SO worth it.

which details do you mean? stuff about the 1848 revolution? tbh i think as long as you have a very basic grasp of the history that's enough, i mean even to the point of just "there was a revolution in 1789 and another couple in the 1830s and 40s". maybe i found it less daunting because i'm a french student and in my politics+philosophy+history degree i studied that period in france about 6 times, but i don't think you need too much of a background knowledge to enjoy the book. just like you don't need to know all the details of the industrial revolution to enjoy thomas hardy (haha you just need a thick skin because he's the most depressing writer ever! but wonderful!)

baba - i've actually not read anna karenina (and as a russophile i feel suitably ashamed) but i have read war and peace and once again it was sooooo worth it. actually war and peace isn't as "difficult" as people make out - it's a cracking story, the writing flows really well and is easy to understand, and it's just a great book generally. the only really tough part is that there are about 50 principal characters which gets a little confusing!

i love russian literature generally: solzhenitsyn who wrote about the soviet system and who was a real insider (he was in the gulag at least once and then exiled for his writings) is one of my top 3 writers, i love dostoevsky, bulgakov, gogol etc, and what i've read of tolstoy i loved. but i think russian literature can be really tough to get into because it's quite verbose (the language is too), and can be quite circuitous! what an english lang book might say in 1 paragraph, a russian one could take a page to say! but it's well worth it :)
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

I'm currently reading the Rough Guide to Babies (although she's over 4 months old now, so it's probably a bit late to start reading about what to do with a newborn, but it's still got some interesting stuff in it). And Annabel Karmel's Complete Baby Meal Planner, so I'll be ready for when we start weaning. My baby brain is too fried to read anything vaguely taxing, and I've become a total baby bore! :lol:
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

I just read 'Before the Storm' by Diane Chamberlain....and I only got it out of the library yesterday. Was lazing in the sun all of today reading it.

The story is about a fifteen year old boy, Andy Lockwood, and his family. Andy has Fetal Alcohol Disorder Syndrome, or FADS, because his mother, Laurel, drank heavily when pregnant with him. The disorder means Andy is emotionally, and in some ways mentally, much younger than 15. He struggles to understand people and things because he takes things very very literally, thinks everyone he knows is his 'friend', has trouble judging what kind of physical contact is appropriate, can't really plan things etc. One night, Andy attends a lock-in at the local church with other kids his age, and there is a fire. Andy saves many of the children there by leading them out of a back window. He becomes a hero in the small community of Topsail Island, North Carolina. Soon, however, the fire is revealed to be arson, and Andy becomes a suspect. His mother Laurel is thrown into a quandry - how can she protect him? And just how well does she know her son? As the story progresses, family secrets and betrayals begin to become unearthed.

I really enjoyed this book. Like 'The Bay at Midnight' it has crime elements to it but is really more about the people involved. There are flashbacks to Laurel's struggles after giving birth to her first child, Maggie, and her drinking while pregnant with Andy, and the complex relationship between Laurel and her brother-in-law, Marcus.

Great read. A lot like Jodi Picoult's books, but without the courtroom/legal system stuff, it's very character-driven, although the plot is very strong, too.
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

Small Places,Large Issues.An Introduction to Social and Cultural Anthropology.Written by Thomas Hylland Eriksen.
 
Re: What Are You Reading?-#3

''The ingredients'' part in my coffe pocket.It says coffee.Interesting.

Also ''The Gathering Storm'' (WOT/Robert Jordan).Especially second half was amazing. I hope they finish the series before i die :p
 
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