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Can we make book recommendations in this post?
I'm re-reading Alias Grace by Atwood and think you'd all like it. http://www.amazon.com/Alias-Grace-Novel-Margaret-Atwood/dp/0385490445/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1333996438&sr=1-1
This is a horrific account of a fire at a school here in Chicago. My family is fromn the neighborhood and watched all the hearses go by for weeks afterwards. http://www.amazon.com/To-Sleep-Angels-Story-Fire/dp/156663217X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1333996340&sr=1-1
I taught A Long Way Gone, and my students' minds were blown. I also rec'd it to Jermy's girl, who loved it. http://www.amazon.com/Long-Way-Gone-Memoirs-Soldier/dp/0374531269/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1333996530&sr=1-1
What different books (as opposed to GoT, HG, Nurtureshock, stuff we've heard of lately) would you send each other's way?
Re: Can we make book recommendations in this post?
11/22/63 By Stephen King.
I couldn't put it down. Amazing.
Ha! I was coming in here to recommend this one. I absolutely loved it. I was (am) obsessed and can't stop thinking about it. I read all 900 pages in three or four days. It's not typical Stephen King. I don't know how to describe it, but it was fantastic.
I just downloaded Columbine and I am anxious to start it.
I always recommend McCarthy. All The Pretty Horses is a favorite as well as No Country
I am always trying to get someone on here to read The Executioners Song by Norman Mailer
Has anyone ever read American Gods? I just started the sample and so far it's......weird.
Curious if anyone had thoughts on it.
Kathleen McGowan's trilogy, Magdalene Line, is awesome. I highly recommend it.
The Expected One
The Book of Love
The Poet Prince
my read shelf:
yes. eh. My husband LOVES it, though.
very, very good. Everything I thought I knew about the shooting seems wrong according to the book.
I have this and The Road on my kindle. Party because you said you love McCarthy, although I know you said you couldn't get through The Road. Anyway, I hope to start them really soon!
The best books I've read lately include Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor, which is amazingly well-written fantasy about a 17 year old girl living in Prague. It's just... so beautiful. It's the first book in a trilogy. The second book will be coming out this fall.
Cloud Atlas: A novel by David Mitchell. This came out maybe 5 years ago. It's a novel of 6 different story lines, all taking place at a different time period (3 in the past, 1 in the present, 2 in the future). It's structured so you start with the earliest story, work your way up to the furthest story, and then back down again. The stories are all interconnected, and part of the fun is looking for the connections. The other part of the fun is how the author is able to write 6 different voices in 6 different literary styles. And then the last part of the fun is that the stories themselves are really great.
I also really enjoyed The Night Circus by Erin Morganstern. It reminded me a little of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrel. The way the story was told, the magical elements, etc.
40/112
Also...
fathermothergod: My Journey Out of Christian Science - I didn't know a lot about Christian Scientists before I read this and it was disturbing and fascinating.
Ask Me Why I Hurt - A little self-indulgent, but eye-opening for me. About a mobile clinic in Phoenix that serves homeless kids.
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - This book was delightful. There is no other word for it lol. It was a quick read, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Reading The Man Who Quit Money right now, it's pretty interesting, started out slow but now I am really enjoying it.
The Unthinkable, crazy insights on how people act in a catastrophe.
Odd Girl Out made me sad and scared that I have a daughter.
I feel lame right now. I just finished Game Change and am now working on The Help. The Help isn't really my kind of book (fiction), but everyone else seems to like it, so I figured I might as well.
I just finished a Jon Krakauer binge: Under the Banner of Heaven, Where Men Win Glory, Into Thin Air, and Into the Wild.
Someone on SO recommended Sex at Dawn, so I'm waiting for that at my library, along with Columbine now.
I also recently finished The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, which was super interesting. It doens't just examine her life, but also her circumstances, changes/advances in medical ethics, race relations in the 20th century, etc. Really really interesting book.
My Lunch Blog
I'm mostly a lurker here, but I just finished reading Mighty Be Our Powers: How Sisterhood, Prayer, and Sex Changed a Nation at War by Leymah Gbowee. It was fantastic.
Also, Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn was life-changing for me.
Put in another vote, too, for 11/22/63. Awesome book.
I second Sex at Dawn, awesome book! Fantastic insight into "human nature."
Pope Joan - Donna Woolfolk Cross
The Red Tent - Anita Diamant
Marek Halter's Women of Canaan series and then his Mary of Mazareth
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostov
The Tender Bar by JR Moehringer
Lauren Willig's Pink Carnation series
my read shelf:
I finished Bringing up Bebe by Pamela Druckerman last week. It was really well-written but fell into the trap of stereotyping American parents.
A little different, but The 3 Big Questions for a Frantic Family was really good. The author is a management consultant. He applied the principles he uses for work to a family to streamline how they function.
Spook by Mary Roach is a really interesting look into research on life after death.
Lurker but I'm jumping in to say that I love this book. I recommend it to people too and no one ever reads it.
I really loved Columbine. I hope you do too!
And a couple books I've read lately and loved:
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline was a really fun, different book that hooked me early and was hard to put down. It's totally geeky and has a big 80's trivia and arcade game element.
The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey is about a childless couple living in Alaska. They build a girl out of snow and she comes to life. It's an old fairy tale reimagined and the writing is really beautiful.
I am clueless on how to make a clicky, but I recommended this a couple weeks ago:
The Last Testament: A Memoir by God
Yes,I'm smiling...I'm a marathoner!
Bloggy McBloggerson
CO Nestie Award Winner-Prettiest Brain-Back to Back!
2011 Bests
5K-22:49 10K-47:38 Half Mary-1:51:50
2012 Race Report
1/1-New Year's 5K-22:11
2/11-Sweetheart Classic 4-mile-29:49
3/24-Coulee Chase 5K-21:40
5/6-Colorado Marathon-4:08:30
5/28-Bolder Boulder 10K
Cinderella Ate My Daughter by Peggy Orenstein
Anything by Christopher Buckley, but in particular I liked Supreme Courtship.
Finally, I picked up the first book of Louise Penny's series featuring Chief Inspector Armand Gamache in February and couldn't put it down. I read all seven of the books in about two weeks - they were fantastic.
These are next up on my list! I love Lisa See. If you like her, you'd probably also like Anchee Minn and, of course, Amy Tan.
In a search for something readable in the Kindle lending library (what a disappointment that's been!), I came across Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential.
It's been a really interesting read, actually. I expected acerbic wit, but it's been more than that.
I wish our library had a better e-book collection. Even the philadelphia library has been disappointing, although I'm assuming that's due to the publishers sucking.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Know-It-All-Humble-Become-Smartest/dp/0743250621/ref=lp_B000APL8HO_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1334002817&sr=1-3
I am listening to the Know-It-All by AJ Jacobs right now (I like to listen to audiobooks during my commute). It is hilarious so far. This is the same guy that did A Year of Living Biblically.
I am getting ready to start Divergent by Veronica Roth on my Nook. It was recommended to me, supposed to be dystopian fiction, similar to Hunger Games in style. Has great reviews.
http://www.amazon.com/Divergent-Veronica-Roth/dp/0062024035/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1334002952&sr=1-1
Divergent was awesome. I like the characters in Divergent even better than the HG characters.
I am currently reading The Bean Trees. I really like it so far. Barbara Kingsolver is a great writer. http://www.amazon.com/The-Bean-Trees-Novel-P-S/dp/0061765228/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1334004644&sr=8-1
The last great book I read before that was The Life of Pi. I have seen this book everywhere and assumed it was about math. LOL, it wasn't at all. But it was FANTASTIC. http://www.amazon.com/Life-Man-Booker-Prize-ebook/dp/B0070Y46UY/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1334004696&sr=1-1
I just read "the other Wes Moore" by Wes Moore and omg. Fascinating premise. It's written fairly simply and mostly just presents a story - he does a good job of not imparting his thoughts TOO much I think.
Anyway, basically it's the true story of two Wes Moores. One grew up in DC, Baltimore and NYC and the other never got out of Baltimore. One became a Rhodes scholar, one is in jail for accesssory to a shooting at a jewelry store where an off duty cop was killed. Both are black, both grew up without fathers and with mothers who worked all the time. Both struggled in school and as teenagers. The book does a great job of exploring the similarities and then the differences between their lives and outcomes. I recommend it to just about everyone. Not the best written book you will ever read, but the kind of book you will want to discuss as soon as you finish it.
Another lurker here... I just finished Free Range Kids by Lenore Skenazy. It was good, but once you get the point, you get the point. The author has a sarcastic voice and I appreciate that. The world doesn't need anymore helicopter parents, so I am trying to reform myself and DH. More so him (naturally).
I just started reading Whatever it Takes: Geoffrey Canada's Quest to Change Harlem and America by Paul Tough. It's good so far but I'm only 2 chapters in. The chapter I'm reading now is about the 2 primary approaches on a federal level to combat poverty (do nothing vs. cash assistance, WIC, food stamps, etc.).