Night Table Reading

Ethyl

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Philadelphia (Pennsylvania, United States)
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99% Straight, 1% Gay
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Female
Who's reading what?

Living to Tell the Tale-Gabriel Garcia Marquez (just started)
Scarred by Struggle, Transformed by Hope-Joan Chittister (just finished)
The Soul of Rumi (staple on my nightstand)
Stone World Magazine (crucial info for work)
 
Currently, there's

Neal Stephenson, Cryptonomicon. A great read, and damn, crazy storylining. But nothing if you're afraid of over 1,000, small-font pages, and five or so story threads.

Denis Guedj, Le Méridienne (1792-1797). For the intellectual side of me, a tale of two French scientists who laid the foundation for the meter scale. It's based on the real events, but packed in a novel-type telling. A bit boring and long in some passages, but very good to read.

Otherwise, you won't find any things to read on my night table.
 
I have a drawer by my bed, and in it is....

The Dark Tower V: Wolves of the Calla, Stephen King
Chicken Soup for the Soul (MY ex Gf's I swear!):rolleyes:
The Client, John Grisham
Dante's Inferno.
Illyad and Oedipus Rex (From a Culture class)
Box Of Condoms:tongue:
 
Let's see...

Inflamation, Please by Arthur Itis
Handel's Messiah by Ollie Lewya
Leo Tolstoy by Warren Peas

...and a couple of very short books...

Different Ways To Spell Bob
The Amish Phonebook
 
Darcy and Elizabeth by Linda Bertoll(Did they live happily ever after?)
Aphrodite: A Memoir of the Senses and Zorro by Isabel Allende (I am addicted)
Always Wear Joy: My Mother ,Bold and Beautiful Susan Fales-Hill (We shall overcome in couture! )
Son of a Witch by Gregory Maguire (No explanation necessary)
Hooking Up by Tom Wolfe (What does that really mean?)
Almost French by Sarah Turnbull (Almost ain't nearly good enough...)
 
Captain Alatriste by Arturo Perez-Reverte. :smile: And The Hobbit by Tolkien.

Oh yes, I like Viggo Mortensen - why do you ask? :tongue:
 
The Illusion of Victory: America in WWI. The author argues the U.S. was needlessly herded into joining the European war in 1917.

How Nature Works. A discussion of chaos theory, fractal geometry and "self organized criticality" in complex systems.
 
I have a few out right now:

#1. "The Arabian Nights - translated by Sir richard Burton (this isn't a damn childrens story. It's a rather sadistic novel in it's raw form)

#2. "Brave New World" - Aldous Huxley (I've loved this one for years)

#3. "The Complete A**hole's Guide To Handling Chicks" - Dan Indante and Karl Marks (All I have to say about this one is that it's about the most humorous thing I've ever read, and there are times when you realize the truth of some things. Just a good coffee table book)
 
Before going to bed like to read something that gives me a head full of peace and a promise of a happy ending in about 450 pages or so.
At the moment I'm reading Tales from MargaritaVille by Jimmie Buffett (not so sure about this one)
I read the set of books by Alexander McCall Smith. The titles of these can throw you off but they are simple rich stories even though they are sort of sound like "chick books ". I can't remember in what order you need to read them but there are about 6 in a series. The stories take place in Botswana and give you a glimpse at daily life there. If you tell anyone I read them I'll deny it !

The number 1 Ladies Detective Agency
Tears of a Giraffe
Morality for Beautiful Girls
The Kalahari Typing School for Men
In the Company of Cheerful Women
The full Cupboard of Life

 
I've been on a biography/autobiography kick lately, so the books stacked around my bed are:

My life - Golda Meir
Leap of Faith - Memoirs of an Unexpected life - Queen Noor (The contrasts in point of view between these two women is quite interesting.)
Gracie - A Love Story - by George Burns (reading the text was just like hearing him speak)
Confessions of the Czarina - Count Paul Vassili (This was published in 1918, before so much of what we've seen had even been dreamed.)

I also read "Without Feathers" by Woody Allen last week when I felt the need for a chuckle.

Geeze, I sound like a nerd.
 
Fight Club- I'm due for a re-read of that.

1776- Starting it tonight

Anthem by Ayn Rand is an excellent short novel to read. Not so much if you're a collectivist
 
My reading is usually voracious; my tastes run the gamut. I just finished a couple of "Star Trek" books; "The Regulators" by Stephen King; "The Darwin Awards"; "Invasion of Privacy (How to Protect Yourself in the Digital Age)" by Michael S. Hyatt; "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them" by Al Franken; and re-read "Stranger in a Strange Land" by Robert Heinlein. Currently alternating between "Medicinal and Other Uses of North American Plants" by Charlotte Erichsen-Brown; "Same Sex Unions in Premodern Europe" by John Boswell; and for technical/professional development, intermittent study of "Comment J'ai Pu Maintenir Ma Forme" and "De la Sonorite" by Marcel Moyse; and a couple of Mass Spectrometry journals. I haven't read them in several years, but have always loved struggling through "Siddhartha" and "Magister Ludi" by Hermann Hesse.
 
GoneA said:
...it most certainly is...


Wolves Eat Dogs by Martin Cruz Smith

Martin Cruz Smith, I've read his Gorky Park. He's great, definitely one of the most skilled contemporary belletristic novelists.

Don't tell me you know Cryptonomicon. Hardly anyone knows this book, which is maybe the best thing Stephenson has ever written. The rest of his work is, sorry, c-r-a-p.
 
Oh, I forgot to add... the only book by Gabriel Garcia-Marquez that I've read is "One Hundred Years of Solitude." I understand surrealism in painting, but that was one of the hardest books I've ever read. I didn't understand large portions of it, and most of what I did understand was so depressing, without any counterbalance. Of course, I was reading a translation. Maybe it would make more sense if I read it in the original language?