What Are You Reading

[Bourbon Guy]

The prequell to Dashiell Hamett's 'The Maltese Falcon'.

Written by Joe Gores - I'm really enjying it.

Talbot

If you like Hamett, try reading Raymond Chandler. Like stepping up from Robert Ludlum to John le Carre. Good stuff.

 

[Ephraim Tutt]

Joan Baez autobiography

 

[John Boyer]

Astonishments: Selected Poems of Anna Kamienska. Kameinska was one of a generation of poets from Poland, born during the 1920s, coming to age during WWII, "learning to write amidst the rat-tat-tat of firing squads and bomb explosions."

Yes
even when I don't believe
there is a place in me inaccessible to unbelief
a patch of wild grace
a stubborn preserve
impenetrable
pain untouched sleeping in the body
music that builds its nest in silence

 

[fluteplayer07]

Public Enemies: America's Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-34 by Bryan Burrough

 

[Harp]

Astonishments: Selected Poems of Anna Kamienska. Kameinska was one of a generation of poets from Poland...

Yes
even when I don't believe
there is a place in me inaccessible to unbelief
a patch of wild grace
a stubborn preserve
impenetrable
pain untouched sleeping in the body
music that builds it nest in silence

John,

Quite a contrast to Eliot's more secular efforts read today.
The circle now includes another contemporary of Simone's,
Marguerite Duras; whom had a philosopher's soul and a poet's heart,
and affects me most profoundly. Will forward her WWII memoir.

 

[Chas]

"Duke Ellington" by Stanley Dance.

Finishing up "The Galloping Ghost", a memoir of Eugene Fluckey. This boy had "muchos heuvos"

I always have several books on the go. That's why I struggle to finish one.

 

[Aureliano]

Finished Bolaño's 2666.

 

[Lady Day]

Food Rules: An eaters manual

'In Defense of Food' was a *fantastic* follow up on 'The Omnivore's Dilemma' (I often listen to the audio book while grocery shopping), but Food Rules is just a cliff notes version of 'Defense', and the latter is a much more satisfying read in that the best rules in 'Food Rules' are actually taken from 'Defense' word for word.

I guess to appeal to the people who are too lazy to read about food history in the US it is a good little coffee table book, but for those that have read Pollan's first two its kinda eh.

LD

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

I'm currently reading Citadel: The Battle of Kursk by Robin Cross.

 

[John Boyer]

John,

Quite a contrast to Eliot's more secular efforts read today.
The circle now includes another contemporary of Simone's,
Marguerite Duras; whom had a philosopher's soul and a poet's heart,
and affects me most profoundly. Will forward her WWII memoir.

Harp,

That would be great. I would enjoy exploring Ms. Duras' WWII memoir. I think you would appreciate Astonishments; she has several poems dedicated to both Weil and Stein; part of the circle. John

 

[Ethan Bentley]

Invisible Giant - Cargil and It's Transnational Strategies.

 

[Feraud]

My first Houdini bio - The Secret Life of Houdini: The Making of America's First Superhero
William Kalush and Larry Sloman

 

[Mysterious Mose]

'Boilerplate, history's mechanical marvel' by Paul Guinan
'The Great Silence, 1918-1920, Living in the shadow of the Great War' by Juliet Nicholson
Mono Workwear no.2 , looking at the pictures.
Good stuff.

 

[Celia Crowson]

It is not a book - but I just finished re-reading Zelda [magazine].
Thoroughly enjoyed it - am looking forward to the next issue.

 

[Talbot]

If you like Hamett, try reading Raymond Chandler. Like stepping up from Robert Ludlum to John le Carre. Good stuff.

Thanks, you are so right. I'm a big fan of Chandler.

 

[Harp]

I would enjoy exploring Ms. Duras' WWII memoir. I think you would appreciate Astonishments; she has several poems dedicated to both Weil and Stein; part of the circle.

John,

Marguerite is the antithesis of Simone. A fecund intellect whose precocious
innocence melts to reveal an earthy sensuous nature; seemingly devoid of mysticism yet not entirely a temporal.
Similar contradictory personalites.
And Duras survived her youth....doubtful they ever met but de Beauvoir knew both
---and she was Nelson Algren's girl. I knew there was a Chicago connection to all this.

 

[K.D. Lightner]

I enjoyed the Elizabeth Kostova novel The Historian and so bought and am reading her second novel, The Swan Thieves.

So far, it is a really good read.

It's nice to have a good book to read when the weather is cold and blizzardy out. I was stranded in the house for the better part of this week.

Don't mind being stranded so much when I have a good book and lots of good food and drink.

karol

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

[Short] Sunderland at War by Chaz Bowyer

Honour Bound: The Chauchat Machine Rifle by Gerard Demaison & Yves Buffetaut

 

[skyvue]

I'm reading a couple of books right now: Michael Sragow's Victor Fleming: An American Movie Master and Richard Rayner's A Bright and Guilty Place: Murder, Corruption, and L.A.'s Scandalous Coming of Age.

I'm still in the early chapters of each, but so far, so good.

 

[Hemingway Jones]

I enjoyed the Elizabeth Kostova novel The Historian and so bought and am reading her second novel, The Swan Thieves.

So far, it is a really good read.

I really liked The Historian. It was spooky and interesting, yet somehow firmly rooted in reality.