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Iceheart
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Right now I'm reading alot of childrens books at the library for the little kids. Currently the book of the day is "The Stinky Cheese Man and other fairly stupid tales". That one was hard to keep my composure, I got hit by a tidal wave of nostalgia and had to fight not to cry.

 

 

On a more serious note I'm reading Faith&Fire by James Swallow

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One Thousand White Women: The Journals of May Dodd by some guy (I'll double check the author later.

 

A coworker was telling me about it the other day, and I thought it sounded interesting, so she brought it in Monday. I started reading it during lunch yesterday and I'm no halfway through it. It's a historical fiction about a proposal that the Cheyenne Indians made to President Grant in the 1870's. They would trade 1000 Indian ponies for 1000 white women. Apparantly that really happened, but of course the government was shocked and appalled by the entire idea and refused. The book is written as a what if, the government had actually gone along with the idea. And pulled women from prison, lunatic asylums, and volunteers. It's definately a good read.

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I am currently reading A Morbid Taste for Bones by Ellis Peters. It's one of the books in the Brother Caedfael Mysteries. Set in the 13th Century in England. Very cleverly written.

 

I just finished Hemlock at Vespers by Peter Treymane which is a collection of short murder mysteries set in 7th century Ireland, featuring Sister Fidelma, a nun and a lawyer. (In 7th century Ireland women were allowed to be educated). Also very cleverly written.

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FICTION: World War Z, An Oral History Of The Zombie War, by Max Brooks

 

 

 

Taking place in the 2010s, the book charts a war against the undead from global pandemic to mass panic, and then to an armed struggle to reclaim the planet. Rather than a grand overview or a single perspective, World War Z is instead a collection of individual accounts, each revealing an aspect of the larger plot and simultaneously presenting a very personal tale. These different accounts take the form of interviews. The book draws from post-apocalyptic and zombie literature. "The Great Panic" chapter describes the rout of civilization in a similar manner to H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds. The tales cover many genres -- the story of a Chinese admiral who spent the war on a submarine would fit easily among techno-thrillers, and the story of Todd Wainio, an American soldier who takes part in the long struggle to regain the United States would appeal to a lot of young adults. The viewpoint is not exclusively American, but focuses on the global nature of the struggle. This use of small personal tales creates a patchwork tapestry of the larger events unfolding in the book. Brooks addresses current issues such as environmentalism, the War on Terrorism and international health care. He also offers an interesting juxtaposition between the modern world and that of postwar Earth. For example, Cuba becomes the world's leading economy, the Israelis and Palestinians make peace, Russia becomes a religious theocracy, and Tibet becomes the most populous country. It is implied that tribal groups such as South American Indians, Zulu of Southern Africa and Māori of New Zealand fared well in comparison to other fighting forces. One character relates an anecdote about how 500 Māori took on half of the Auckland horde, using traditional tribal weapons, and fared much better than the world's various military forces or Western civilians.
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Just finished "Ghoul" by Brian Keene. Good book if you like reading about some teenage boys in 1984 discovering that there is a nasty and I mean nasty ghoul living in the local cemetary. Lots of Star War references in the book, especially when one of the boys goes down into the underground tunnels in the cemetary looking for someone and he pretends to be Han Solo walking the hallways of the death star. Classic.

 

I just started Offspring by Jack Ketchum today and it's a sequel to his controversial first book called "Offseason" which is about this canibalistic group of young people who live in the caves and woods of Maine and kill people who cross their path. It's a very gory book, but so far the sequel is very tame compared to the first. Hopefully it will get bloody soon.

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I read the Yiddish Policeman's Union and... well, lets just say I was not all that thrilled with it. I found it a little tedious and not because of all the Yiddish, dunno why really.

 

I finished Shatner's latest book. He pokes fun at himself, and at this point in his career, how could he not? According to him it took him a long time before he mellowed out off set and realized that laughing at one's own self is not necessarily a bad thing.

 

Other than him promoting his website at least once in every chapter so someone will go there and buy some stuff from him, I found the book to be funny, full of interesting tidbits and ok in general. Its not earth shattering, though I did learn a few things I did not know, since I like Star Trek well enough, just am not a Trekkie by any stretch. Shatner's book is a quick read (I know, I use that phrase a lot, but if your like me and read a lot of books at once, there usually is that one book that takes forever to get through and the others are quick) and obviously only telling his side of the story (especially his take on the relationship between him and the rest of the original cast of ST, which I already knew, but w/e). But, if you know things about him better than I, the book will quickly bore you.

 

I did get a smidgen more respect for the guy. He has cahones to go out there and do some rediculous things... some good, some just down right nasty... just to keep working at something he loved and at one time, to prove to his father that acting was not so bad of a career.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Reading the "Horus Heresy" series. Just finished the first book "Horus Rising" and am starting the second book, "False Gods". Sometime next week hope to be reading the third book, "Galaxy in Flames". It's set in the 31st millenium (it's part of the warhammer 40,000 universe, except it's ten thousand years previous). "Horus Rising" was really good, and I can't think of anything by that author (Dan Abnett) that isn't excellent so I recommend people check it out.

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Just finished reading Nick Hornby's A Long Way Down. Took reading about half the book to get into, but once I was it wasn't that bad. I'm in the middle of reading The Demons by Dostoevsky, too, but that sometimes gets put to the side for something else... I feel like I can always go back to it. Right now, though, I'm deciding what I'd like to read.

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I just picked up "Baltimore,: or, The Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire" by Mike Mignola of Hellboy fame. I was looking to see if my library had any of the afore mentioned Hellboy and came across this.

 

I'm reading Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates by Tom Robbins. I'm only four pages in, but I'm already cracking up! What are your thoughts on this guy? I'd never heard of him before for some reason...apparently I'm the last one to know.

 

Tom Robbins is one of my favorite all-time authors. Enjoy the humor and frivolity in the book, but be prepared to be blind-sided with subtle and not-so-subtle social commentary that actually makes you think... and makes you keep thinking years later.

Another Roadside Attraction and Skinny Legs and All are my top two. Feirce Invalids and Jitterbug Perfume tie for third in my book, but I've yet to read a Robbins book I didn't like.

What about Villa Incognito? I found that one to be lacking. It was still enjoyable, but I put it down at the bottom of my Robbins List. I need to re-read all of these.

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What about Villa Incognito? I found that one to be lacking. It was still enjoyable, but I put it down at the bottom of my Robbins List. I need to re-read all of these.

 

TOTALLY lacking. My favorite of Robbins is Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas. I am a proud owner of a signed copy with a Happy Birthday message inside, thanks to a good friend of mine.

 

I do need to reread his works, as well.

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Half asleep in Frog Pajamas was probably the hardest Ropbbins book to get into just because of the format. You wake up. You brush your hair. You are a successful wall street broker. You are a woman. Kind of hard to imagine. Once I got into it, it was great, but it posed a barrier at the start.

 

I think my favorite is Skinny Legs and All, or Invalids. Or Another Roadside Attraction.

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Taking a break from the Horus Heresy (which I'm now on the fourth book, Flight of the Eisenstein, I don't have it with me but I'm willing to bet the author is James Swallow.), and about to start reading "BATMAN:The Ultimate Evil" by Andrew Vachss. The Blurb on the back says it's about Batman going to take on a group who traffics in the flesh of children.

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Reading The Château by William Maxwell. It's about an American couple travelling through France shortly after the war. It is excellent. I just returned from a week in France myself and the descriptions of struggling with the language, culture, etc are spot on.

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I'm starting Ulysses by James Joyce tonight. It sounds pretty interesting from what I've read about it while putting together my new book list. Since I haven't started reading it yet, I wouldn't explain the whole concept well since it's very detail oriented in the way it's written so if you're curious about it I'd check out Wiki page. On a basic level it follows the tale of a young man going about an ordinary day in Dublin with several plot parallels drawn from Homer's The Odyssey. Anyway, I'm excited about checking it out.

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Half asleep in Frog Pajamas was probably the hardest Ropbbins book to get into just because of the format. You wake up. You brush your hair. You are a successful wall street broker. You are a woman. Kind of hard to imagine. Once I got into it, it was great, but it posed a barrier at the start.

 

I think my favorite is Skinny Legs and All, or Invalids. Or Another Roadside Attraction.

 

Yeah, it was pretty hard to get into. In fact, I doubted I could even get through it. But, yeah, once you get into it, I think it's a really enjoyable read --- obviously, since I just said it was my favorite of his.

 

Fierce Invalids is another favorite, but second to Half Asleep. I love Switters dearly.

 

Hum. Anyway, I'm reading some Tennessee Williams plays: Summer and Smoke; Orpheus Descending; Suddenly Last Summer; Period of Adjustment. They're all in one paperback. How convenient. I forgot I picked it up at a book fair last year... and was happy to find it because I was in the mood to read something different.

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Did a little bit of reading on my vacation:

 

Celine Dion's Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste (33 1/3) by Carl Wilson

and What Happened Later by Ray Robertson

 

Now I'm reading X Saves the World: How Generation X Got the Shaft but Can Still Keep Everything from Sucking by Jeff Gordinier

because I have a thing about reading about Generation X.

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I'm now on Richard Laymon's "The woods are dark" It's been fully restored and uncut for the first time in America. It was originally published in 1980 and was edited to death for content.

 

Laymon passed away a few years ago and his daughter found his original manuscripts and put the original story back together. It's a very quick read, only 220 pages.

 

It's not as intense as his other books but along the same lines. I felt the beginning was more frightening than the actual horror scenes. In the beginning these two girls who are going to go hiking in the woods decide to stop off at this town and get a bite to eat at this country diner and everything seems fine and then when they try to leave the door is locked and all the townspeople tie them up.

 

The townspeople offer outsiders up for sacrifice to these creatures out in the local woods.

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