What are you reading right now?

**thescot** · 5th January 07, 09:57 PM

Just finished an S. J. Perelman book whose titile I cannot remember. Before that it was Great Expectations and The Red Badge of Courage.

Since I teach several courses, I read all the time. And I read of lot of the classics. I even read The Iliad last semester.

For fun I have a Celtic Mythology book next to the bed. I also have classes reading--and therefore I am reading along--The Catcher in the Rye, The Fellowship of the Ring, and will soon issue The Fountainhead.

My favorite writer is Pat Conroy because I think he's the best writer on earth (since Bill Shakespeare bought the farm). But I read just about anything, and I read all the time.

**auld argonian** · 5th January 07, 10:02 PM

The Life And Times Of The Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson.

Best

AA

**KiltedKnight** · 5th January 07, 10:09 PM

I've been struggling through three books myself in addition to the "Bathroom Readers".

I have been frying my brain on three of Richard Feynman's books on physics, his thesis "A New Approach to Quantum Theory", "Tips on Physics" and "Six Easy Pieces". Believe me, the "Bathroom Reader" is much more entertaining!

Chris.

P.S.

If anyone wants these books after I finish with them you are more than welcome to them as a gift...(NOT the "Bathroom Readers"!)

**Deil the Yin** · 5th January 07, 10:31 PM

Originally Posted by auld argonian

I'm halfway through "Great Expectations"...which I never read before and am finding fantastic...I can see why Dickens is Dickens as a result of reading it.

But...I've put "GE" aside for a while to read "THUD" by Terry Pratchett. More adventures of the Ankh Morpork Nightwatch...I read "The Fifth Elephant" a while back and it was so good that I grabbed "THUD" when I saw the paperback on the racks. just have to have some fantasy/escapist material to read...

Best

AA

Have you read Pratchet's "The Wee Free Men"? It's freakin' hilarious!

At the moment I'm working on my first go round of A Confederacy of Dunces... which I'm rather injoying.

**Improv1** · 6th January 07, 07:57 AM

Auld Argonian wrote

The Life And Times Of The Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson.

Have you read any other Bryson? The man is a genius!

**Pour1Malt** · 6th January 07, 08:02 AM

in the middle o'

The Stornoway Way
by Kevin MacNeil

**Warlock** · 6th January 07, 08:06 AM

I have a large library of supernateral and horrer fiction. I have a signed first edition of a biography on H.P. Lovecraft. I also have a battered edition of "Lovecraft at last" which is the memoirs of a gentleman that had corresponded with Ech-Pi-El {HPL} as he became known. I believe the author was Willis Conover, Jr. I Love that genre.

**wsk** · 6th January 07, 08:57 AM

Originally Posted by turpin

The 100 days, by Patrick O'Brian. The adventures of "Lucky Jack" Aubrey and the crew of HMS Surprise during the period between Napoleon's escape from Elba and Waterloo.

I love these books. Just started The Wine Dark Sea which is number 16 in the series. I've also just finished a couple of short books by a guy called Slim Randles: Dogsled and Sun Dog Days. The first is the author's description of his adventures as a novice musher in 1970's Alaska and the second is a fictional account of modernday cowboys in California.

Another recent book is The Shantyboat by Harlan Hubbard which is an account of the author's and his wife's journey douwn the Ohio and Mississippi rivers in a home-built shantyboat in the 1950s.

I've also just finished reading The Art of Kiltmaking. Hope to put that to use next fall.

And I've set myself the task of reading Othello before we go see the play in mid February.

**wsk** · 6th January 07, 09:14 AM

Originally Posted by McMurdo

and I think I will finally pick up
the Da-Vinci code
By Dan Brown
I dont want to be the only person on the planet who has not read it.

Don't. It isn't worth the effort. The man can not write. I found the characters to be flat and lifeless - you learn nothing about them except what is needed to fit them into the structure of the story. Since the characters have no life I could not like them.

And who's to say that being the "only person on the planet who has not read it" isn't a good thing?

Life is too short to read bad books.

**Panache** · 6th January 07, 11:20 AM

Originally Posted by Beuth Sim

I have a large library of supernateral and horrer fiction. I have a signed first edition of a biography on H.P. Lovecraft. I also have a battered edition of "Lovecraft at last" which is the memoirs of a gentleman that had corresponded with Ech-Pi-El {HPL} as he became known. I believe the author was Willis Conover, Jr. I Love that genre.

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn

Cheers