Read anything good lately?

[Dark Tangent]

With the book club dead maybe we can just talk about books we have read or plan to read.

My "aspirational" purchases are usually books I hope to have time to read, and looking back on recent purchases it has been:

• We are Bellingcat: Global Crime, Online Sleuths, and the Bold Future of News
• Putin's People: How the KGB Took Back Russia and Then Took On the West

Kind of an open source / behind the curtain theme. I'll let you know how they are.

[dmr]

I just re-read The Eudaemonic Pie following a chat on a LV board about clocking roulette wheels.

[galefoote]

I just read City of Bones by Cassandra Clare, which is a young adult fantasy with demons, vampires, and werewolves. I enjoyed it, it had a bit of a Buffy feeling but without the romance.

io games

[Dark Tangent]

That sounds interesting. How did they clock the wheels? Cameras or sound?

[Valhir]

Im reading some school material, but I found one book particulary interesting called introduction into Automata Theory, Languages,and Computation, I need something more interesting to read

[dmr]

That sounds interesting. How did they clock the wheels? Cameras or sound?

It's quite dated, technologically speaking, but a shoe-based microcomputer, 6502, with toe switches for input and a vibrator for output. They worked as a team with one inputting data and another placing bets. They got pretty good at predicting in which quadrant the ball would land. It's a good read, although dated and with lots of digression.

[Winston Hughes]

I am currently reading Les Misérables is a French historical novel by Victor Hugo. This is one of the largest and one of the most incredibly deep and interesting books I have read. I have read half of the book, but I am already convinced that it will become one of my favorite stories for my whole life.

[Dark Tangent]

I've never read it but seen the play.. how far off is it?

[httP404]

Like all the writers of that time, they perfectly describe the lowest and cruelest society, the human hypocrisy, more or less what we suffer today, we have not changed anything, we are only satisfied that that time is not repeated but, without realizing it, we are living it.

[dmr]

I am currently reading Les Misérables is a French historical novel by Victor Hugo. This is one of the largest and one of the most incredibly deep and interesting books I have read. I have read half of the book, but I am already convinced that it will become one of my favorite stories for my whole life.

I remembered enjoying Les Mis when it was assigned reading back in high school. I saw the stage musical, but it was 20-some years after I read the book and although I recognized and remembered the plot and some scenes, memory had faded so I could not really make an educated comparison between the book and the musical. LOL, I also just realized that it's going on 30 years since I saw it on stage. I have never seen the film (any of them).

One novel I am currently re-reading (almost re-finished, as it's fairly short) is The Catcher In The Rye by J.D. Salinger. This was also assigned reading back in HS. At the time it was noted that it was an "adult" novel, and that so many years before a HS English teacher was indeed fired for assigning it. This, of course, made us all more eager to read it. :)

At the time, I did not think it was really that explicit, I mean there were a few f-bombs, but nothing that kids of that era had not seen or read (or thought about - LOL) and euphemisms were used for much of the sexual context. LOL, I had totally forgotten about the "giving the time of day to" euphemism for, uh, doing the Horizontal Bop! {blush} I'm feeling nostalgia as I re-read it, remembering that back in the early 70s, we considered the slang in the book (50s vintage) to be stale and dated.

In re-reading, it's almost tame. If you have not read it, it's a "coming of age" story, first-person narrated, with a protagonist who has been thrown out of yet another exclusive prep school and his antics over an extended weekend in the city, trying to figure himself out, and trying to avoid his family. :) Everyone can identify with it, his thoughts and feelings and confusion. Although I was never thrown out of a boarding school, many of the situations, particularly the awkward ones, really hit home, back so many years ago, and now.

It's a good read, you can easily read it in one evening, and I recommend it to those who have not read it.

I'm quite surprised that nobody has ever produced a film version. It's really quite tame compared to countless films out in current circulation.

[Tree]

I read ready player one like 7 years ago, good book.

[mikko]

With the book club dead maybe we can just talk about books we have read or plan to read.

My "aspirational" purchases are usually books I hope to have time to read, and looking back on recent purchases it has been:

• We are Bellingcat: Global Crime, Online Sleuths, and the Bold Future of News
• Putin's People: How the KGB Took Back Russia and Then Took On the West

Kind of an open source / behind the curtain theme. I'll let you know how they are.

I hear "If It's Smart, It's Vulnerable" has at least a great foreword.

Mikko

[toomedium]

I’ve been reading the murderbot series by Martha Wells. Good story, well told.

[Dark Tangent]

It is fast reading and enjoyable, half mystery have personal journey, she has a winning formula.

[Solo_Hero]

I recently read SHIVER by Junji Ito. I also plan to read Know No Fear The Battle Of Calth by Dan Abnett. I've been meaning to get into the Horus Heresy books from Warhammer 40k, and this is my entry point.

[tommEE]

There's a Customer Born Every Minute by Joe Vitale
A lot of stuff about Barnum in it.

[dmr]

WTF? I thought that looked familiar and it's a cut-paste of what I posted well over a year ago in this thread, above!

I remembered enjoying Les Mis when it was assigned reading back in high school. I saw the stage musical, but it was 20-some years after I read the book and although I recognized and remembered the plot and some scenes, memory had faded so I could not really make an educated comparison between the book and the musical. LOL, I also just realized that it's going on 30 years since I saw it on stage. I have never seen the film (any of them).