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On 2/25/2019 at 11:35 AM, wild_turkey said:

A Gentleman in Moscow

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It took me a little bit to get into it, but I really enjoyed it by the end.

Yep, I really enjoyed it.  Also, recently finished Rules of Civility and liked it as well, but not as much as this one.

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On 2/13/2019 at 3:06 PM, Longhorn94 said:

there is no doubt it inspired emotion, thought, and reaction. 

next up is Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises and then The Son.

Ok, i have come around on Blood Meridian to love it and recommend it. Now that I understand what it was, I appreciate it a lot more. 

I LOVED the Sun Also Rises! My affinity for it probably has a lot to do with the fact I am taking my wife to Paris next week. I loved the intimate peek into life in Paris and Spain the 1920s. I loved the style and dialogue. I think reading BM really prepared me for this one in that they were both rather random views into life at those places during the respective time periods.

I am reading the Son now. WHY DID SHE OPEN THE DOOR???

 

 

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On 3/5/2019 at 8:45 AM, Bogeywon said:

reading "Heavier than Heaven" its a Kurt Cobain bio.  pretty good stuff. he just seems like he hated everything and no matter what he was going to die.  pretty sad stuff

That one's a real good one. His manager wrote a book that's coming out in April for the 25th anniversary of his death. Can't wait to read it.

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36592392.jpg

And done with Barr's follow-up book on the Middle East. Read Ike's Gamble (about the Suez Crisis) a couple of years ago, but this was a much broader overview of U.S.-British conflict in the ME.

Edited by demos
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  • 2 weeks later...
On 3/30/2019 at 11:15 PM, MillerEP said:

Book 8 of the Expanse dropped last week. I stopped everything and am about a quarter of the way through it. Great as always so far:

Tiamat's Wrath (The Expanse Book 8) by [Corey, James S. A.]

How do they compare to the show?  I am a fan of it and if the books are even better, I may have to read them.  The amount of thought the author must have put in to life and travel in space is very impressive.  I don't think I've ever seen a show about space where a serious attempt was made to follow the laws of physics.

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How do they compare to the show?  I am a fan of it and if the books are even better, I may have to read them.  The amount of thought the author must have put in to life and travel in space is very impressive.  I don't think I've ever seen a show about space where a serious attempt was made to follow the laws of physics.


Surprisingly the show sticks very close to the books and novellas. Obviously, there's more in the books to flesh out characters and plots, and things from the books that don't make it into the show, but fortunately the show doesn't suffer from it. If you like the science of the show you'll really like the books.
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  • 2 weeks later...

Just finished "I'll be gone in the dark" about the EAR, later named The Golden State Killer, GSK.

 

I was born and raised in Orange County in the late 70's-80's (before moving to Dallas), so it was interesting to hear details of such a barbaric killer.

Incidentally, the book was written prior to the events of April 2018 (in the spirit of not spoiling any details).

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On 4/7/2019 at 6:51 PM, MillerEP said:

 


Surprisingly the show sticks very close to the books and novellas. Obviously, there's more in the books to flesh out characters and plots, and things from the books that don't make it into the show, but fortunately the show doesn't suffer from it. If you like the science of the show you'll really like the books.

I started the series.  It's great so far, very glad I decided to.  Thanks.  You mentioned novellas, are those part of the 8 books out so far or are they in addition to them?

Edited by kevwun
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They're in addition to them, to build out the world and provide backstory to characters they didn't get to into the books. I'll try not to be spoilery, but essentially this is roughly what they are. I'll put them in spoilers just in case. You can bypass them and it wouldn't take away from anything.:

Spoiler

Drive - Backstory about the creator of the Epstein Drive.

The Churn - Backstory for Amos.

The Butcher of Anderson Station - Backstory for Fred Johnson.

Gods of Risk - Some world-building about Mars.

The vital abyss - Worldbuilding of the proto-molecule scientists.

Strange Dogs - (haven't read, but I think it's worldbuilding after the events of Babylon's Ashes) 

 

Edited by MillerEP
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I can't find the post to give rep, but someone recommended Hernan Diaz's In the Distance.

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Just finished it this morning -- that was a fantastic read, one of the best books I've read in a while, and thanks to this thread, I've read a lot of good ones lately.  I really do appreciate all the great recommendations in here.

Up next, going on a WWI tangent with Goodbye to All That, then rereading All Quiet on the Western Front.

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1 minute ago, Blanton said:

Subject matter looks really interesting. Thoughts so far?

Great book.  I knew what the plan was years ago (get Von Braun, etc here) but I had no idea that the US actually imported Nazi doctors who had performed human experimentation.  That was a bit.....unsettling.  I shouldn't have been totally surprised, but some of the things the US did in the name of national security and the fear of what the USSR might have been doing was a bit surprising.  It's a fine line between morality and security.

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2 hours ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

Great book.  I knew what the plan was years ago (get Von Braun, etc here) but I had no idea that the US actually imported Nazi doctors who had performed human experimentation.  That was a bit.....unsettling.  I shouldn't have been totally surprised, but some of the things the US did in the name of national security and the fear of what the USSR might have been doing was a bit surprising.  It's a fine line between morality and security.

Absolutely. It makes us wonder if Nazi Germany had never been the war machine it became, would the rest of Europe crumbled quickly and never been recovered to communism? 

Obvisouly it doesn’t excuse anything Hitler’s Germany did, but it does the raise the question if the Russians were any better than the Nazi’s? Christ knows how many people were executed under Stalin’s regime 

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On 4/5/2019 at 8:10 AM, wild_turkey said:

Under the Banner of Heaven

9781400032808

I didn't know much about the Mormon faith and their history until reading this. Wow, very eye opening. We almost need a separate thread to discuss this subject in general.

This book is amazing, really.  I’ve read it several times over the years and it’s always in the top 5 or so books I recommend to others.  I’ve read all his books at least once, except Missoula, which I’ll take with me on a trip starting next week, along with David McCollough’s The Pioneers and Donna Tartt’s The Little Friend.  I swear The Goldfinch has almost ruined reading for me, because I know that nothing else I read will ever be that good.  

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Just read The Dog Stars this week based on this thread. Great book. Heller's writing is beautiful. I went ahead and ordered The Painter. It may not be as good but if it has the same great poetic prose as Dog Stars then I'll probably look into the rest of his books, even the nonfiction. 

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I swear The Goldfinch has almost ruined reading for me, because I know that nothing else I read will ever be that good.  


That’s good to hear because it’s next in my queue right after I finish The Overstory.

I felt the same way about All the Light We Cannot See ruining other books for about 6 months.
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