[Joshua]

As an admitted book-addict, I'm curious to hear what books you all are buying. What were the last few books you bought?

I'll start:

The Plague by Albert Camus
Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner
Toward The End Of Time by John Updike
Castaways of the Flying Dutchman by Brian Jacques

All purchased in a moment of weakness this past weekend at Barnes & Nobles.

[The Placid Casual]

I read loads, when I buy books I end up buying a good few to keep me going...my last batch were;

Haruki Murakami - The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, Norweigan Wood
Thomas Hardy - A pair of Blue Eyes (and a hard back of Jude the Obscure)
James Hawkes - Round Ireland with a Fridge
Bram Stoker - Jewel of the Seven Stars
Oscar Wilde - Picture of Dorian Grey
John Williams - Cardiff Dead
James Brookmyre - Not the end of the world

I can recommend them all, they are all great reads although my personal favourites are the 'classics'...esp Hardy, although Murakami is just an amazing author...

Marc

[mindwaves]

Well, I havent purchased any novels to read in a long time so I only have some textbooks to share:

1) Math 2D (multidimensional calculus)
2) some writing books and supplements
3) some physics supplements

This is actually rather a short list compared to what I had to spend first quarter. I only spent like $150 this quarter when last time, I spent around $400+.

[dhidekii]

The good thing about being an English major is that you get to read a lot of good stuff (and a lot of bad stuff too). Here are a few of my last book purchases...

1) Norton Anthology of British Lit - Vol. 1
2) Shakespeare's Henry IV
3) Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment
4) Viramontes' Under the Feet of Jesus

[- - e r i k - -]

Jakob Nielsen - Designing Web Usability (for the second time, as I lost my previous copy).
Scott Adams - The Joy Of Work
Douglas Adams - Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
J.R.R. Tolkien - The Hobbit

Long time since I purchased books though. I'm on the lookout for the big book with Lord Of The Rings, and I've also ordered House Of Leaves (can't remember the author)...

[G4ME]

I just got catsa craddle by Kirk Vaunagan an interesting read
I just finished up the Stand by Stephen King, I love him
Timeline by Michle Criton, An interesting sci-fi book, with quantum mechanics.
I highly recomend both of the books listed above

[maxelson]

The Club Dumas- Arturo Reverte Perez (recommend it)
Atlas Shrugged- Ayn Rand (don't know yet)
Obsidian Butterfly- Trash reading for summertime- Vampires, zombies, psyche thriller, yaddah, yaddah.
OS X Black Book- got to get as much under my belt as possible in a short period of time
UNIX in a Nutshell- ditto.
Moby Dick- OK. I already owned it, but I am ALWAYS reading from it. My favorite book.
Of Wolves and Men- Barry Lopes. Loaned it to a friend ages ago, never got it back, bought another. EXCELLENT book.
I am hoping for a copy of Red Sox Century for father's day. If I don't get one, that'll be next.
Oh- G4ME- I am not sure if you are just making funnies, but that's Kurt Vonnegut of Cat's Cradle and Slaughterhouse Five fame. I leap on this like a jack of apes because Vonnegut is one of my absolute favorite author/ctitic/personalities of all time.

[ 06-15-2001: Message edited by: maxelson ]

[Timo]

OK: I've been reading mostly history/sociology, I need a good novel. But what I bought recently:

Past Imperfect -- Tony Judt: Judt's damning of Sartre and the rest of the French apologists for Stalinism

The Burden of Responsibility -- Tony Judt: a short history of three postwar French figures, including Albert Camus, who weren't wishy-washy from Judt's point of view

Masculine Domination -- Pierre Bourdieu's (a sociologist) essay on the pervasiveness of a male viewpoint in even innocuous everyday life

Biblioth�que nationale de France -- a coffee-table book about Domminique Perrault's new national library in Paris, which from what I can tell from those people I talked to is roundly hated. But, for me, a very "Galiga" place -- a piece of the future here now for those who cannot wait for tomorrowland. Finally: can you imagine this country (USA) spending $2 billion on a library? Hell no! More bombers!

I've been on a French kick 'cause I just came back from visiting France for the first time in ten years, and it felt good to grab some of the culture along with those croissants.

T

PS. their internet caf�'s suck: smokey and those damn French keyboards. One run by some Japanese ex-pates was good, though -- even switched to QWERTY for me.

[gwrjr33]

Some of these I've already given as gifts to others. The first two I already own. Looking to get through 4 or 5 of these this summer. Hoping you guys don't give me too many more good ideas.

The City of Man - Augustine
The Art of War - Sun Tzu (currently reading and rereading)
From Plato to NATO, by David Gress
Philip Roth's American Pastoral
Kaddish, by Leon Wieseltier
The Killer Angels, by Michael Shaara
Cities of the Plain - Cormac McCarthy (third of the Border Trilogy)
The Politics of Bad Faith, by David Horowitz
Cold Mountain, by Charles Frazier
P.J. O'Rourke - Eat the Rich: A Treatise on Economics
Summer for the Gods - Edward J. Larson (on the Scopes trial)
Radical Son, by David Horowitz
Whitaker Chambers's - Witness
St�phane Courtois and others, The Black Book of Communism
The Oak and the Calf, by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II, by George Weigel
The Quest for Cosmic Justice, by Thomas Sowell
Joseph Shattan's Architects of Victory: Six Heroes of the Cold War

________________

42

[Cipher13]

I've read way too many to name...

At the moment, I'm reading: From The Corner Of His Eye, by Dean Koontz - excellent book.

But, I have to recommend to everyone, 1984 by George Orwell... if you haven't read it, you oughta be ashamed

[eep!]

Trading Reality by michael ridpath, i'm only a few chapters in so I won't recommend it just yet. (I bought it cos it sounded interesting and it was cheap!)

Beginners Japanese by helen gilhooly
beginners japanese script by helen gilhooly
I always wanted to learn japanese.

And a little book on art deco by iain zaczek.

[SillyMonk]

I buy a lot of books and am happy to see so many sugggestions here.

The last two I bought were:

The End of a Primitive by Chester Himes :

Here is the plot summary by the author, a black man writing in the 1950's: 'i put a sexually frustrated American woman and a racially frustrated black American male together for a weekend in a New York apartment, and allowed them to soak in American bourbon. I got the result I was looking for: a night mare of drunkenness, unbridled sexuality, and in the end, tragedy." Sounds fun huh?


Ravelstein by Saul Bellow :

A fictional memoir of Allan Bloom, the author of "Closing of the American Mind."


The last I read was:

Adrift by Steven Callahan :
True story about a man lost at sea for 76 days! I love sea stories!

[l'ignorante]

Time's Arrow by Martin Amis and The Famished Road by Ben Okri.
I used to read a book a week, now it's maybe one a year.

[Cipher13]

Oh... they must be mentioned:

Matthew Reilly: Contest, Ice Station and Temple.
There awesome books. Read them - action mostly. They just rock.

[maxelson]

Sillymonk- End of a Primitive sounds very cool. Do you recommend? How's the style? SOunds very Edward Albee-ish to me (on that note, a HUGE and hearty recommendation of WHo's Afraid of Virginia WOlfe" to anyone who has not read it... or seen the film - pretty good in a pinch- not awarm and comfey story, I'll tell you, but satisfyingly brutal and dark)
l'ignorante- so, how IS TIme's Arrow- it is one of those books I keep hefting in the bookstore and then saying, yah, not yet.

[l'ignorante]

Originally posted by maxelson:
<STRONG>
l'ignorante- so, how IS TIme's Arrow- it is one of those books I keep hefting in the bookstore and then saying, yah, not yet.</STRONG>

Well.. I loved it! You should read it, it's a thin book anyway .

[juanvaldes]

books? oh, paperweights! Lets see I just got

The Ultimate Hitchikers Guilde - Douglas Adams, it's so awesome all of the book in one volume!

Winters Heart- Robert Jorden, book 9 of the Wheel of time, gotta love em!

Does Dilbert count? If so I have read all of thoses over and over...

[SillyMonk]

Originally posted by l'ignorante:
<STRONG>Time's Arrow by Martin Amis and The Famished Road by Ben Okri.
I used to read a book a week, now it's maybe one a year.
</STRONG>

The Famished Road was one of the more challenging books I have read in a while... I got it because it was a Booker winner, and it turned me off Booker books! It is a very good book, well written, but it left me leaving a little stoopid, which I never like in a book! I used to read four novels a week, I would read during all meals, after dinner, any free time at all. It was wonderful, but I lived alone then.

Sillymonk- End of a Primitive sounds very cool. Do you recommend? How's the style? SOunds very Edward Albee-ish to me (on that note, a HUGE and hearty recommendation of WHo's Afraid of Virginia WOlfe" to anyone who has not read it... or seen the film - pretty good in a pinch- not awarm and comfey story, I'll tell you, but satisfyingly brutal and dark)

I haven't read enough of it yet to fully recommend it. I will say that it is dark and also considered one of Himes' best works, also his personal favorite. Its my first by him. He was angry at America for being rascist and bitter for not buying his books. So yes it is probably dark. As for "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" I think I would like to read that one. Thanks for the tip!

PS If you can get through Moby Dick you are a better man than I.

-John

[mikithecrackhead]

the complete idiots guide to picking up women. by AL Koholik
the best of barely legal magazine. 2nd edition by woody allen
101 ways to remove the hair from your palm. by pual ruebens
moby dick ( misled by the title)
understanding syphilus by Phil Mcraquin

[pathogen]

"My Family's Yule Ball Recipies and other Christmas Desserts" by Bill Schweaty, published by SNL.

You've gotta love wrapping your mouth around those delicious Schweaty balls. Who knows any other dirty puns that SNL does so well?

This week I read The Three Muskateers (A. Dumas) and The High Window (R. Chandler).

[ 06-15-2001: Message edited by: pathogen ]