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

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by rocketgranny

The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith (Barnes & Noble, $1.99).
- Very nice.

Yes, I agree - I really liked them. There's also an excellent film and TV (BBC/HBO) series based on the books.

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by neilmarr

Hello there, Kenny and Tom: We have a lot of reading in common it seems. The Edge can be a little accademic at times and heavy on medicine, but it's worth subscribing to, and its videos are often quite fascinating. Here you go: http://www.edge.org/ Cheers. Neil

Thanks, Neil. I'll be checking it out in a few minutes!

Currently Reading

I'm currently reading around twenty books, but I'm steadily whittling that number down. One of the books I'm reading very slowly (but carefully) is The Ode Less Traveled: Unlocking the Poet Within by the legendary Stephen Fry. I know it isn't the author's intention, but he has pretty well convinced me that I don't have what it takes to be even a bad poet, much less an accomplished one. Perhaps the moment that opened my eyes more than any other was when he produced a poem he wrote especially to illustrate many of the things that go wrong in the works of countless modern poet wannabes. Entitled "Post coitum omne animal triste", it contains "All the clichés, ... pointless lineation, meaningless punctuation and presentation, fatuous creations of new verbs 'cigaretted and drinked', 'worlded', 'nuded', 'afterloved', a posy Latin title—" and he assures us that "every pathology is presented." He goes on to add, "My 'poem' is also pretentious."

The problem is that really enjoyed reading the 'poem'.

Here it is, in it's entirety:

Post coitum omne animal triste

i see you
!
you come
closer
improvident
with your coming
then—

..............stretched to scratch
—is it a trick of the light?—
i see you
worlded with pain
but of
necessity not
weeping

..............cigaretted and drinked
loaded against yourself
you seem so yes bold
irreducible
but nuded and afterloved
you are not so strong
are you
?
after all

Fry says, "The above is precisely the kind of worthless arse-dribble I am forced to read whenever I agree to judge a poetry competition. It took me under a minute and a half to write and while I dare say you can see what utter wank it is, there are many who would accept it as poetry."

The book, despite crushing all my hopes and dreams of glory, is wonderful. Fry is a very entertaining writer who doesn't shy away from the technical details and terms of the art.

[lilac_jive]

I just started "Stiff" today for the book club. This is going to be interesting.

[neilmarr]

Now, I'm no critic of fine art, but I know what sucks when I see it. (Line from a novel I just edited, Tom.) Neil

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by neilmarr

Now, I'm no critic of fine art, but I know what sucks when I see it. (Line from a novel I just edited, Tom.) Neil

I actually liked the invented word "cigaretted", thought "afterloved" (another invented word) was insightful, and found the idea of a poet taking a break while writing to announce that he "stretched to scratch" quite clever!

Shows you what I know!

Guess I'll stick to self-publishing on bathroom walls.

[recluse]

Just started "The Man Who Loved Books Too Much: The True Story of a Thief, a Detective, and a World of Literary Obsession" by Allison Hoover Bartlett. Can't put it down.

[Billjr13]

I just bought Mario Acevedo's Werewolf Smackdown in pbook (...the shame) because he will be doing a signing near here next weekend. And as I have said, it is so hard to sign and ebook. Fun series with Felix the vampire PI.

[lilac_jive]

Originally Posted by recluse

Just started "The Man Who Loved Books Too Much: The True Story of a Thief, a Detective, and a World of Literary Obsession" by Allison Hoover Bartlett. Can't put it down.

I read that and loved it.

[ficbot]

I am reading 'The Happiness Project' and liking it a lot more than I thought I would. Also reading 'The End of Science Fiction' from Read an Ebook Week and really enjoying it too. The first chapter was horrible, it was written like a script and I almost deleted the book on the spot but then once the story started, it got very good and I am curious to see how it ends.

[mikemck]

I just spent an hour scanning e-pub books available here and downloaded close to 15 or 20. Amazing resource, thank you very much.

Also power reading through the "Codex" series by Jim Butcher. I very much enjoy Butcher, even go as far to say he's one of my favorite authors, but his love scenes............Oy, if I read any more about "luxurious kisses" "depths of desire" and " deep growls" I swear to god I'm going to vomit in my mouth.

Mike

[DixieGal]

Blood Brothers by Nora Roberts.

[Crusader]

Busy with "Persuader" by Lee Child.

[lene1949]

Arrrgh... Nothing.. I just finished Wolfsigns and didn't start another one...

[cearbhallain]

Finished Child of Fire, found it to be a great first effort in the urban paranormal genre. I liked it better than I liked Dresden Files but not as much as I enjoyed Patricia Brigg's latest.

Just started Kris Longknife Undaunted by Mike Shephard. It's the 7th in a series of old-fashioned space opera with a strong female protagonist - what's not to love?

[Billjr13]

Originally Posted by Crusader

Busy with "Persuader" by Lee Child.

How is it so far?