Hey!! Let's get some action going! What are we reading?

[dreams]

Originally Posted by HarryT

The BBC is funded by the taxpayer through a TV Licence. Every household in the UK (that owns a TV) has to pay £145.50 a year (about $230) for this.

Thanks for explaining. That is just for one channel or is that the whole of your channels? I have a very basic TV package and it is $65 (about £42) a month. That doesn't include movie channels or anything else.

I've just started The Library of Lost Books by Darius Jones and Dave Fey

Spoiler:

Where do lost books go?

The Babylonian texts thrown in the Tigris by the Mongol invaders of Baghdad. The sequel to Gogol’s Dead Souls burned to ashes by its own creator. The original edition of The Seven Pillars of Wisdom misplaced by T.E. Lawrence in a train station. Are these books destroyed forever in those moments? Or does a piece of them live on?

By day, Darius is a struggling ad writer. One night, he slips into a hitherto undiscovered world where a small group of determined guardians preserve lost books. As he explores this new world, he learns the techniques used for gathering and preserving the lost manuscripts.

But all is not well. Darius’ arrival has set in motion a series of events that threatens to bring down the entire world. If Darius hopes to preserve the Library and all it contains, he must reach within himself to find the strength to face the greatest threat this world has ever known.

Where do lost books go? They go to the Library of Lost Books.

reading Ghost Walker by Ian MacKenzie Jeffers.
Which the film The Grey is based up on.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by HarryT

The BBC is funded by the taxpayer through a TV Licence. Every household in the UK (that owns a TV) has to pay £145.50 a year (about $230) for this.

I'm not sure it's accurate to say that the BBC is funded by the taxpayer. The HMRC does not collect the licence fee, it's collected by the BBC, or by companies working for the BBC under the trade mark "TV Licensing"

The BBC is funded by every household in the UK that watches live TV.

http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/about/f...ramework-AB16/

[MickeyC]

Just finished Here's Looking at Euclid by Alex Bellos; an excellent non-fiction on the history of mathematics. Interesting and thought provoking.

Next up, Tell No One by Harlan Coban.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by dreams

Thanks for explaining. That is just for one channel or is that the whole of your channels? I have a very basic TV package and it is $65 (about £42) a month. That doesn't include movie channels or anything else.

That covers the BBC channels only, from what I understand. (I'm not now, nor have I ever been, a UK resident. Though I did live there for one semester's worth of college in the 1960's.) Certainly, from my remote perspective, it appears to be a laudable system that produces a quality result.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by dreams

Thanks for explaining. That is just for one channel or is that the whole of your channels? I have a very basic TV package and it is $65 (about £42) a month. That doesn't include movie channels or anything else.

It pays for everything the BBC does. About 8 TV channels, goodness knows how many radio stations, web sites, etc. There are of course innumerable commercial TV channels too, but you have to pay the TV licence regardless of what you actually watch.

But this is getting horribly off-topic. Suggest we start a new thread elsewhere if you'd like to continue the discussion .

[Marrella]

Recently finished books:

After the Apocalypse by Maureen McHugh
This is a collection of stories with the underlying theme of, well, an apocalypse of some kind that had just happened. There are different approaches including viruses or zombies. In fact, there was only one story that I thought was weak.

The Guards by Ken Bruen
An Irish mystery about a cop who has just lost his job. Black humor all over the place and the main character is a real loser. This was a short, fun read.

Butterfly Summer by Anne-Marie Conway
A young adult book about a twelve year old girl who stumbles across a family secret after moving back to the town she has supposedly left before her birth. I liked this quite a bit.

Now reading: way too many books...

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Interesting. I'm through the first two books and onto the third. I don't really beleive in the characters, but the technology is fun.

And in the third novel, things get really silly, but I have a sort of dreadful fascination in finding out what unbelievable thing he's going to come up with next, or I'd be bailing out of this book now.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by HarryT

But this is getting horribly off-topic. Suggest we start a new thread elsewhere if you'd like to continue the discussion .

We can continue over here if people want.

[LucyLu]

I've just finished "Firefly rain" a supernatural thriller written by Richard E. Dansky about a "prodigal son who leaves the big city to return to his dearly departed parent's house in North Carolina only to find, now that he's home, that something is trying to make damn sure he stays there, even if it means burying him out back."

According to several reviews it's a gripping, terrifying, spine chilling, action-packed novel about a hunted house.....In reality it's not so gripping and above all not so spine chilling since I fell asleep twice during the reading. The main theme of the book it's not the haunted house but the house of boredom...

Don't waste your time and money. It's not really worth it!

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

And in the third novel, things get really silly, but I have a sort of dreadful fascination in finding out what unbelievable thing he's going to come up with next, or I'd be bailing out of this book now.

I'm into the last quarter. I'll finish this, but I don't think I can recommend it.

[alansplace]

Originally Posted by alansplace

Better To Rest was really a good read! It's too bad that the week of the release of the Omnibus version eBook ($9.95 at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and iTunes) of the Liam Campbell series was the same week when I finished reading the last book in the series so I have little excuse to buy it, oh well. Now off to the Sierra Nevada mountains for the last book in the Charlie Chan Omnibus, Keeper of the Keys by Earl Derr Biggers.

Keeper of the Keys was a highly enjoyable final novel in the Charlie Chan series. I found it a little difficult to quit that time period, so I've begun reading The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan.

[Shopaholic]

I just finished Shadow of Night, the second book in the All Souls Trilogy. I liked it better than Discovery of Witches. I found the story to be more interested and involved than the first one.

I'm just starting the Fablehaven 5 book series. It's been compared to the Harry Potter series so I thought I'd try it. I'm also working my way through Greg Allman's My Cross to Bear.

[DrNefario]

I've just finished Way Station by Clifford D Simak, the 1964 Hugo winner. I kind of liked it. It was offbeat and contemplative SF, with a hint of fantasy, about a man who has secretly run an intergalactic teleported station for a hundred years without ageing.

Before that I read The Secret Adversary by Agatha Christie. Her second novel, and fairly minor, but easy to read and quite enjoyable. More action-packed than you might expect.

And before that I read Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. It annoyed me a bit at first with its geekish pandering, but once the story kicks into top gear it's a great ride.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by DrNefario

I've just finished Way Station by Clifford D Simak, the 1964 Hugo winner. I kind of liked it. It was offbeat and contemplative SF, with a hint of fantasy, about a man who has secretly run an intergalactic teleported station for a hundred years without ageing.

Hmmm. I remember reading that and liking it, a lot, when it first released. Thanks for the reminder!