OT: What are you currently reading?

[Glycerin]

I'm digging this thread back up, since I have time to read now. I just finished A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. Now I'm reading West with the Night by Beryl Markham.

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[ItsOverZyvox]

Ok, I'll play. My mild case of ADD doesn't let me read one book at a time. (only when I travel because I can't take 5 books with me)

Here are books I'm reading now.

 

[ItsOverZyvox]

And here is the book I finished last week. The original "Slumdog Millionaire"

 

[fenixtnlfan]

I loved both of Hosseini's books! He needs to write another one. I started reading Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer awhile back. I've got to finish it now that it's spring break! I don't have a lot of time to read during the semester because I hate putting books down and tend to read them in one sitting.

 

[Old Timer]

I just finished Lee's Generals. Could someone please explain why the South started a war they could not win?

 

[ItsOverZyvox]

I just finished Lee's Generals. Could someone please explain why the South started a war they could not win?

Similar reason Japan attacked Pearl Harbor?

 

[ItsOverZyvox]

I'm just kidding..

 

[ItsOverZyvox]

But there are parallels. The Confederacy simply did not have the industrial resource to win against the Union. The lack of petroleum supply to Japan eventually starved them to death. Similar fate enjoyed by the Nazis.

What's startling is that the global economy's major battles are still over natural resources instead of intellectual capital. Our evolution still has a way to go.

 

[kdt110]

I loved both of Hosseini's books! He needs to write another one.

Me too! I heart Hosseini's books.

 

[Requiem]

roberston davies - fallen angels.

 

[RutgersEMSOP10]

i dunno - i LOVE atlas shrugged (and the fountainhead, although i don't think they are interchangable...)

if you really believe that ayn rand's point was that you should never help people, you misunderstand the entire premise of the book/her philosophy...

the way i take it, and maybe i'm wrong, is that every man and woman has a moral obligation to do whatever it is that they do to the very best of their ability and those who don't fulfill that very basic tenant are undeserving of pity and, therefore, charity.

She does not claim that you should not be charitable, just that the goernment should not FORCE you to be charitable. You should choose who/what you wish to give aid to based on your belief that it is deserving of that aid. For example, I believe the family of a child with leukemia is deserving of help; I don't believe octo-mom is deserving of help. I should not be forced to help her (or people like her) by the governement.

I think she presents some fundamentally American principles that we have lost sight of -

1. Every man has the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness - that does not guarantee equal outcome (The American ideal of 'equality' has been completely twisted - it does not mean we are 'all created equal', cuz let's just be honest, we are not...I am not, nor will I ever be 6'5" and play in the NBA. Does that mean no one should be able to?)

2. The government should answer to us - not the other way around!

3. A person's 'need' does not give them claim to my life or my ability. Remember, I have the right to my life just as you have the right to yours - You do not have the right to my life, nor do I to yours.

4. "Greed" does not mean wanting more than you need for the basics - it means wanting more than you have EARNED. If I save lives everyday and make 1 million dollars a year, I have earned it, and then some; I am not greedy.

I think Ayn Rand was a very interesting (and eccentric) person who had a point of view that none of us can even imagine - having her entire family's life work and success stripped from them in Soviet Russia 'for the greater good' until finally being able to escape the country and come to the US - a place where she felt abiltiy was rewarded over failure.

p.s. the "free market" did not ge us into this economic mess - our market has not been 'free' for a very very long time, if ever.

 

[RutgersEMSOP10]

oh, i lost sight of my point -

I recommend Atlas Shrugged. You may or may not agree with the premise, but it is an interesting one nonetheless.

Also, the Harry Potter series is pretty much awesome, and Twilight is good for girly fun. It is by no means good writing, but it is silly and you can easly get lost in it.

 

[fenixtnlfan]

Oh, I love Ayn Rand books though I think some of it goes over my head. I agree with what your wrote about the intent of her books.

 

[bananaface]

I read Shopgirl over break. It's a Steve Martin novella.

 

[medicalCPA]

Just finished reading "The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World," by A.J. Jacobs. The author spends a year reading the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and his account is at once funny, deep, gross, and immature. Overall it was good.

However, after he mentioned his Brown education, living in East Hampton, and going to a super-selective private school, he began to sound like some rich white guy with too much time on his hands. (I have nothing against said group of people, and if my statement is offensive to you, be offended).

 

[rphello]

Burmese Days, by George Orwell. It's superior to his well-known Animal Farm but inferior to 1984.

 

[medicalCPA]

I just read "Room for Improvement" by Stacey Ballis. It's a mindless and amusing "chick-lit" book that has murdered my brain cells.

 

[medicalCPA]

Runs With Scissors was ok. In the genre of creatively elaborated memoirs I prefer Eggers' "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius".

I just finished reading that, and I have to admit, it was definitely one of the worst books I have ever read! Good Lord, and it was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize???!!??

 

[charfdorn]

Have any of you heard of Bookswim? It's Netflix, but for books. I'm thinking of getting it as a gift for my other half (and that way, I can use it, too! ).

You mean like the library?

 

[charfdorn]

I read Shopgirl over break. It's a Steve Martin novella.

"The Pleasure of My Company" is better. I didn't like "Shopgirl" much.

Just read "Miracle at St. Anna" (James McBride) recently. It's good. Also, "The Shadow of the Wind" by Carlos Ruiz Zafon.

 

[JAGATO]

I recently read Kill Bin Laden by Dalton Fury, it's a great book!