Good reads for the summer

[Weirdo]

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Now that summer is rolling around, any suggestions of must read books to pass the time.

 

[wendywellesley]

my goals for this summer:

finish Lolita (great great book!)
Crime and Punishment
House of God
Complications: A surgeon's notes on an imperfect science
probably assorted short stories and poety.

 

[iamlonely]

my plans:
prepare gen physics,modern physics,genchem,orgchem, cellbio, review mcat bio, read 101 verbal passages, review vector calc, read some science articles. if i had unlimited time, i would try to read the textbooks/articles from which all the prior years' mcat verbal passages were taken.

 

[PookieGirl]

Stiff, by Mary Roach

Only on page 26 but pretty good read so far. It's all about cadavers-- how people get them, what they are used for, people's reactions to them, the process of decomposition. Fascinating.

 

[Thundrstorm]

Stiff, by Mary Roach

Only on page 26 but pretty good read so far. It's all about cadavers-- how people get them, what they are used for, people's reactions to them, the process of decomposition. Fascinating.

I'm over halfway through. It just gets better. I don't know how she makes dead bodies funny, but she does. I def. second this recommendation. 👍

 

[UDbiochem]

Harry Potter 6 comes out in July. 😍

 

[LadyBulldog]

i was thinking about trying this new book...the title is something like never eat alone: the secret to success.....its written by a yale alum and is all about how life is more about who you know, and how to make sure you know the right people.....sounds useful to me...or just a bunch of bs....

 

[deleted50541]

I am looking to tackle a number of classics that I neglected to read in the past:
Wuthering Heights (just finished and what a great story)
War and Peace (about a third of the way through)
Anna Karenina
Jane Eyre
Pride and Prejudice

Of course, Harry Potter too. 😉

 

[wendywellesley]

I am looking to tackle a number of classics that I neglected to read in the past:
Wuthering Heights (just finished and what a great story)
War and Peace (about a third of the way through)
Anna Karenina
Jane Eyre
Pride and Prejudice

Of course, Harry Potter too. 😉

are you XX or XY?

 

[deleted50541]

are you XX or XY?

XY(check the avatar). I know how that list must look. But I assure you I am a red-blooded, meat eating, beer drinking hetero. 😀

 

[wendywellesley]

XY(check the avatar). I know how that list must look. But I assure you I am a red-blooded, meat eating, beer drinking hetero. 😀

more power to you. I have yet to meet another man who admits to reading and liking Jane Austin and Bronte.

 

[MollyMalone]

I am looking to tackle a number of classics that I neglected to read in the past:
Wuthering Heights (just finished and what a great story)
War and Peace (about a third of the way through)
Anna Karenina
Jane Eyre
Pride and Prejudice

Of course, Harry Potter too. 😉

Excellent list! 👍

 

[Thundrstorm]

I am looking to tackle a number of classics that I neglected to read in the past:
Wuthering Heights (just finished and what a great story)
War and Peace (about a third of the way through)
Anna Karenina
Jane Eyre
Pride and Prejudice

Of course, Harry Potter too. 😉

I 😍 Wuthering Heights. It's one of a few books I had to read in high school that I voluntarily re-read and kept in my collection. My goal last summer was to read Anna Karenina. Once I got into it, it was great. I actually stopped abotu 20% short of the end because school started and I got too busy, but I look forward to finishing it. It's really great.

 

[Doc.Holliday]

Harry Potter 6 comes out in July. 😍

68 days, 8 hours 27 minutes and 15, err 14, no 13 seconds left!!!

 

[housecleaning]

cadillac desert

 

[scoops418]

I 😍 Wuthering Heights. It's one of a few books I had to read in high school that I voluntarily re-read and kept in my collection. My goal last summer was to read Anna Karenina. Once I got into it, it was great. I actually stopped abotu 20% short of the end because school started and I got too busy, but I look forward to finishing it. It's really great.

Heathcliff is the man!

 

[shantster]

Stiff, by Mary Roach

Only on page 26 but pretty good read so far. It's all about cadavers-- how people get them, what they are used for, people's reactions to them, the process of decomposition. Fascinating.

Yeah.. it took me the whole semester to read it (stupid school work that comes in the way of good reading time) but it was quite enjoyable.

 

[erin682]

Harry Potter 6 comes out in July. 😍

lol. thats what I was going to say. Good to see I'm not the only obsessed one on SDN.

 

[drguy22]

68 days, 8 hours 27 minutes and 15, err 14, no 13 seconds left!!!

JULY 16th...

 

[Megalofyia]

MAD magazine
Uncle John's Bathroom Reader bookes 5-10

Yep that's probably about the extent of the reading I'll do.. I might read some other comic books and magazines.

 

[Larsitron]

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius was my favorite read last year.

 

[Amorphisgirl]

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius was my favorite read last year.

This book is by David Eggers. My friends and I looked at it, because we heard it was like "THE SCENE THING TO READ", but we couldn't imagine the hours wasted, reading his whiny, wallowing, BS, no offense, Larsitron. (This guy experienced a great loss. However, he is or was on MTV. )
Instead you could read David Sedaris' whiny,wallowing, BS. His prose is more entertaining, in my opinion. He's been on NPR a bunch.

My favorite book is Magazine. Anyone read Vice magazine?

 

[deleted50541]

Lisa: List your three favorite books and how they have influenced your life.
Homer: Is TV Guide a book?
Lisa: No.
Homer: Son of Sniglet?
Lisa: No.
Homer: Katharine Hepburn's Me?
Lisa: No.
Homer: Oh, I suck!

🙂

 

[SpeedRacer]

infinite jest is awesome (david foster wallace) but i've been reading it forever and am only on pg350. the newer dave eggers - they shall know our velocity - is pretty good...not as good as heartbreaking work though. also, fear and loathing in las vegas! pay the dead man some respects.

 

[ajt2003]

Stiff, by Mary Roach

Only on page 26 but pretty good read so far. It's all about cadavers-- how people get them, what they are used for, people's reactions to them, the process of decomposition. Fascinating.

SUCH A GOOD BOOK! Loved it. Two thumbs up. It's really amazing what we learn from dead people!

I'm on a Dean Koontz/James Patterson/Patricia Cornwell kick. All quick reads. Fun adventures/thrillers from which you learn nothing. These are the type of empty books we need right before med school, right? Right.

 

[taddpole]

Just thirding Stiff...Its good until the end, I started reading it over a year ago and can't get past hte last 5th of the book. Not sure why.

I'm reading complications now, VERY good book, definitely a must read.

Others:

The Handmaids Tale
Middlesex (AMAZING book)
War is a Force That Gives us Meaning
Ghost Soldiers.


Enjoy!

 

[v j]

for something different try _atlas shrugged_ by rand. you'll either love it, hate it, or think it's too damned verbose to be worth reading.

now that everyone thinks i'm some libertarian psycho, i'll take my leave...

 

[LabMonster]

Harry Potter 6 comes out in July. 😍

I'm camping out

 

[mx_599]

i just read

when the air hits your brain: tales of neurosurgery (frank vertosick, 1995)

i thought it was pretty good...but then again i hardly ever read books so i am probably easy to please

 

[LabMonster]

for something different try _atlas shrugged_ by rand. you'll either love it, hate it, or think it's too damned verbose to be worth reading.

now that everyone thinks i'm some libertarian psycho, i'll take my leave...

I've been meaning to read it. Any work receiving such polarized opinions must be worth looking at.

Also HP 6

Moby Dick
Hitchhiker's Guide..
lots of Shakespeare
and any classic I can get my hands on.

 

[deleted50541]

Stiff, by Mary Roach

Only on page 26 but pretty good read so far. It's all about cadavers-- how people get them, what they are used for, people's reactions to them, the process of decomposition. Fascinating.

Sounds interesting. I may have to pick that one up.

 

[Megalofyia]

I'll second Stiff. I read it last year on my way to interviews. It was good airplane reading!

 

[Karina]

Stiff, by Mary Roach

Only on page 26 but pretty good read so far. It's all about cadavers-- how people get them, what they are used for, people's reactions to them, the process of decomposition. Fascinating.

Read it...it's a good book. Right now I am on "Genome" by Matt Ridley. After doing the whole Dan Brown thing with the Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons...I decided to go for more scientific books...prep me up for med school 😛

Karina

 

[Karina]

I think I really want to be a dork and read "The Naked Ape", "The seven daugthers of Eve" and "Adam's Curse" before the summer is over 😉

Karina

 

[drfunktacular]

The Amazing Adventures of kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susannah Clarke
This book is great so far, but I am only about halfway through (which is still 300 pages!). It is about 18th century British magicians. Some sample dialogue:

--"'My dear Lascelles,' cried Drawlight, 'what nonsense you talk! Upon my word, there is nothing in the world so easy to explain as failure--it is, after all, what every body does all the time.'"--

--"'You never saw her?' said Drawlight. "Oh! She was a heavenly creature. Quite divine. An angel.'
'Indeed? And such a pinched-looking thing of a ruin now! I shall advise all the good-looking women of my acquaintance not to die,' said Mr. Lascelles."--

It is like a Victorian Harry Potter.

And if you think A Staggering Work of Heartbreaking Genius isn't worth reading, you're a fool, a DAMN fool. I have never read another book that made me laugh and cry at the same time the way it did. It does, however, require a certain appreciation for the post-modern irony that is rather prevalent among the current generation of young authors (Sedaris, DFW, et al.).

 

[melimi]

I'll second Stiff. I read it last year on my way to interviews. It was good airplane reading!

i'll fourth stiff, its mad interesting ****
def keeps u wanting more dead bodies around

 

[acf11]

I totally agree about Atlas Shrugged; its definitely one of my favorites.

 

[CoffeeCat]

The Handmaids Tale

👍 Great book, I love Margaret Atwood.

If you're looking for a science book, I just read The Virus and the Vaccine: The True Story of a Cancer-Causing Monkey Virus, Contaminated Polio Vaccine, and the Millions of Americans Exposed - a great book, science, politics and consipiracy theory (supported by science) all rolled together.

 

[QueenofCryptic]

If anyone is looking for a fun, challenging read, get some of Nabokov's books...I mean besides Lolita. He writes beautifully, even though it's sometimes a chore to get through. I recommend The Defense and Pale Fire.

Vanity Fair is a fun read too.

As for myself, I'm planning to start reading some of Evelyn Waugh's books, which come highly recommended by many friends. If you're Catholic and/or pretentious, you'd probably like him too.

 

[Agent Splat]

My list for the summer:

Naked by David Sedaris
Dress your Family in Corduroy and Denim by David Sedaris
Crime and Punishment
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Foer
American Gods by Neil Gaiman
America by Jon Stewart
Mavericks, Miracles, and Medicine, by Julie Fenster

If I get to three of those I'll be lucky. But I'm gonna try, starting this Thursday. I'd also love to reread Population: 485 by Michael Perry.

 

[deuist]

Tuesdays with Morrie

 

[Amorphisgirl]

infinite jest is awesome (david foster wallace) but i've been reading it forever and am only on pg350.

Re: David Foster Wallace

Yesterday I went to find Infinite Jest. Couldn't find this one, so I took Brief Interviews with Hideous Men, instead. It seems to be a collection of short stories. So far, I have read about 50 pgs. This guy's sentence structure reminds me of "Howl" by Ginsberg (never-ending). I was amused (for a minute) by what passed as "an ode to a depressed person", but sentences there ran on for whole pages. Not to mention, five or so pages of "The Depressed Person" had footnotes which were half to a full-page long in and of themselves. This tripe actually won some awards, too. Descriptive stuff ala Bret Easton Ellis is awesome--in my opinion, this guy is nuts.

Infinite Jest is supposed to be about drug-culture. While that sounds entertaining, I'm not so sure I can wade through 300+ pgs of it. 😕 Suggest another book? 😛

 

[tigress]

I think I really want to be a dork and read "The Naked Ape", "The seven daugthers of Eve" and "Adam's Curse" before the summer is over 😉

Karina

Why not add The Third Chimpanzee by Jared Diamond? I've not gotten to it yet but it's on my list. And read Guns, Germs, and Steel while you're at it. The latter is a really awesome book.

So right now I'm reading In the Hands of the Great Spirit by Jake Page, which is about the history of American Indians. I think I want to read about US and world history as well this summer, because I realized I don't remember most of the history I learned in school. For fiction, I recently went through all of Orson Scott Card's books except the Ender series. He tells a good story, but by the end of at least two series (Homecoming and Alvin Maker series) the books got way too Mormon for me. Actually Earthborn, the last of the Homecoming series, was less science fiction than political and religious commentary, and now that I'm reading more about Joseph Smith and Mormonism, it seems the whole Alvin Maker series was basically a fantasy version of Joseph Smith's life. Still, the books were all fun to read.

Oh, and I also once picked up A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius and couldn't get through it. And the newest book by Jonathan Safran Foer seems sort of contrived, with the colored wording and blank pages and all that other stuff. Has anybody here actually read it and have any comments? Some of David Sedaris' work is funny and some of it isn't so much. Likewise, I sometimes like his appearances on NPR and sometimes don't (there was one particular one about filling the toilet bowl as a guest that totally grossed me out).

Can anybody suggest good books about US and/or world history? I want to start with some overviews and then maybe pick a few topics to go more in depth on. I love the book suggestion threads on this board! A lot of the books I've read recently have come from these threads. And I agree with others on here -- I want to read some classics that I've never gotten to. It makes me feel uneducated that I haven't read them!

(sorry for the long post; this is one of my favorite topics! 👍 )

 

[SanDiegoSOD]

I'm currently reading "Health Economics: Fundamentals and Flow of Funds", by Thomas Getzen. Understanding health economics is hugely important, especially for someone like myself wanting to work in public health and business. The book is written for non-economists, so I've found it easy to understand, and very applicable. This knowledge is going to be great come interview time 😀

 

[DrRads101]

The Case for a Creator. One of the most eye opening books I ever read and great for those searching....

 

[Thundrstorm]

As for A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, I struggled through the 1st half of it and I just couldn't get into it. I stopped trying about a year ago.

 

[hildaluc]

There are 2 books by Abraham Verghese, "My Own Country" and "The Tennis Partner" that are exceptional. He is an infectious disease specialist and an amazing writer. An English teacher at my school uses these books in his class.
👍 👍 👍 👍 👍

 

[tigress]

There are 2 books by Abraham Verghese, "My Own Country" and "The Tennis Partner" that are exceptional. He is an infectious disease specialist and an amazing writer. An English teacher at my school uses these books in his class.
👍 👍 👍 👍 👍

My Own Country is a good book and definitely worth reading. I haven't read The Tennis Partner but from what I've heard it brings to the forefront all of the sketchy things about Verghese's character that I felt during the first book. Although I enjoyed the book, I'm not so sure I'd like the man. Actually he just wrote an interesting piece about literature and medicine, published in the New England Journal of Medicine. I agree that My Own Country is definitely worth the read. I gives a really interesting perspective on the AIDS epidemic and the role of the doctor in general.

 

[kailey]

I suggest House of God. I read it and really liked it. I will also be reading Harry Potter 6 this summer but right now i'm reading The diving bell and the butterfly. It's interesting.

 

[aragonh]

I've been meaning to read it. Any work receiving such polarized opinions must be worth looking at.

Also HP 6

Moby Dick
Hitchhiker's Guide..
lots of Shakespeare
and any classic I can get my hands on.

I want to read Hitchhiker's Guide. Want to know why 42 is the meaning of life!!

I also want to read The Purpose-Driven Life by Rick Warren. Supposedly its a good book.

Going to re-read the The Alchemist. It's an easy read with a great message. I highly recommend it.

Ayn Rand books are good . . . except she doesnt allow her evil-doers to take the next step.