This Week I are mostly reading (contd)

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Just finished We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves. Wouldn't go so far as to say it was rubbish, but it was fairly poor.

Callan57

Dear Life by Alice Munro

Huzzah!

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

Just finished We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves. Wouldn't go so far as to say it was rubbish, but it was fairly poor.

Agree wholeheartedly with this. It gets so many good reviews, though, that I thought I was on my own in my dislike for it!

Belle E. Flops

Finished the Deathly Hallows and I'm quite sad to be done. I'll leave it a few years again before I start the series off again.

Started ' The Clothes They Stood Up In' by Alan Bennett. I'd never even heard of him until I saw The Lady in the Van a few weeks ago but I'm really enjoying the way he writes.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

I found a copy of The Secret Garden in a box in my room the other day that my mum got me for Christmas one year when I was a nipper. I'm fairly sure I read it back then but don't remember that much of it so I said I'd give it another read. About half way through and must say I'm really loving it.

GeneralC

I picked up a copy of The Power of Now and A Short History of Nearly Everything

Thanks to all on here for recent suggestions.

Best,

minnow

"The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay" by Michael Chabon. I loved "The Yiddish Policeman's Union" so am checking out his past books.

ivytwine

minnow wrote: »

"The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay" by Michael Chabon. I loved "The Yiddish Policeman's Union" so am checking out his past books.

Great book!

Callan57

In The Name of Love by Patrick Smith

Fathom

Light Between Oceans, by Stedman

Callan57

The Silver Linings Playbook by Matthew Quick

Belle E. Flops

Just starting Under Major Domo Minor by Patrick DeWitt. I loved the Sisters Brothers so I have high hopes for this.

SarahBM

Finished Birdsong. A bit over hyped IMO.

Started Shift, the second book in the Silo trilogy.

I read the Happy Prince and a few other short stories by Oscar Wilde too.

Dial Hard

Cloud Atlas, in the very brief reading-for-pleasure break I allow myself over Christmas, before heading back into the endless merry-go-round of college assignments in January :-(

bnt

Seveneves by Neal Stephenson. It doesn't get much more apocalyptic than this ... :eek:

Daisy78

Eggshells by Caitriona Lally

Callan57

Finished The Silver Linings Playbook .... superb.

Now it's Sebastian Faulks Where My Heart Used To Beat

Wyldwood

Finishing up my 2015 reading with Louise O'Neill's Asking for It. It's an uncomfortable read, the subject matter is so controversial and she constructs the protaganist, Emma, as a particularly unlikeable character which makes it difficult to sympathise with her plight. However, I must say that O'Neill has done a wonderful job of getting into the heads of all those involved and describing the way Emma and her family are treated after the events.

Recommended reading for all young adults I would say in order to highlight the issue of consent/rape

Unfortunately, I failed my Goodreads challenge this year for the first time, I'm 5 books behind thanks to some mighty tomes by Follett and Mantel.

Happy New Year and good reading to all.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Wyldwood wrote: »

Finishing up my 2015 reading with Louise O'Neill's Asking for It. It's an uncomfortable read, the subject matter is so controversial and she constructs the protaganist, Emma, as a particularly unlikeable character which makes it difficult to sympathise with her plight. However, I must say that O'Neill has done a wonderful job of getting into the heads of all those involved and describing the way Emma and her family are treated after the events.

Recommended reading for all young adults I would say in order to highlight the issue of consent/rape

Unfortunately, I failed my Goodreads challenge this year for the first time, I'm 5 books behind thanks to some mighty tomes by Follett and Mantel.

Happy New Year and good reading to all.

I think it was a deliberate decision to make Emma hard to like (let's call it that). It shines a light on the fact that we do let things like that influence our thinking when it comes to feeling sympathy/empathy. It's far easier to feel sympathy for the kind sweet girl that everyone loves than for a self centred selfish stuck up bitch (for want of a better word). Even if it's the exact same thing that's happened to them.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

I read The Green Road by Anne Enright over two days there to try and get it into my 2015 Goodreads, still missed my target though

Anyway, it was rubbish. A collection of really horrible people being selfish and then it's all very loosely ties together with some rubbish about a house. I've lost track of how many books I've read this year that feel like someone had a bunch of short stories and tried to tie them together and make them a novel.

Bad end to my 2015 reading.

Das Kitty

Funnily enough, it was my favourite of the year!

eire4

Finished a re read of Anne Rice's Memnoch The Devil. An interesting read although not as good as the first 4 books in her Vampire Chronicles series.

Belle E. Flops

I read my first Agatha Christie in the the last couple of days, 'And Then There Were None'. I absolutely loved it and raced through it. I don't usually read mysteries but I was thoroughly entertained trying to solve it.

Moving onto 'The Ginger Man ' by JP Donleavy now.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Belle E. Flops wrote: »

I read my first Agatha Christie in the the last couple of days, 'And Then There Were None'. I absolutely loved it and raced through it. I don't usually read mysteries but I was thoroughly entertained trying to solve it.

Mini series of it was on BBC over Christmas there.

Belle E. Flops

TICKLE_ME_ELMO wrote: »

Mini series of it was on BBC over Christmas there.

Ooooh must have a look at that. Thanks.

TICKLE_ME_ELMO

Belle E. Flops wrote: »

Ooooh must have a look at that. Thanks.

I watched it there today, all 3 episodes back to back. Was very impressed.

Callan57

Starting Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro

Mehaffey1

Catching The Wolf Of Wall Street by Jordan Belfort. Obviously going to be a big disappointment compared to the 1st but enjoyed it so much I had to buy the 2nd.

EoghanIRL

Finished reading Do No Harm. I really enjoyed it and would highly recommend it.

The man who mistook his wife for a hat. I have read about half of the stories. I didn't enjoy it as much. The stories are indisputably intriguing but... I can't help and feel that it strays into a lot of philosophy which I don't particularly enjoy and also it does refer to neuroscience quite a bit. I have taken neuroscience in college and so was able to understand it and definitely felt that having prior knowledge of brain damage amongst other things was essential to my enjoyment of the book so far. It doesn't sufficiently explain things if you have no knowledge at all. However the stories of the patient's and their lives are worth reading! It deals with conditions and cases which I didn't even realise existed.

ahlookit

Finished Dub Sub Confidential by John Leonard .... not exactly your average sporting memoir! At times I found the author to be really annoying ... but he has been through an awful lot in life. Worth a read, but not one for the easily offended.

Going back to Beatlebone now. Abandoned half way through last week, really like some of the sentences Kevin Barry writes, but thought this so far (and City of Bohane) have been a bit hard going.