What are you reading?

[MendoDave]

Any of you Cali guys remember the SLA (leftist terrorist group that kidnapped Patty Hearst)?
Reading Jeffrey Toobin's great book on the whole thing. I think I was 10 when she got kidnapped and remember watching their safehouse burn down on the news. Turns out she was holed up in a motel room near Disneyland about 3 miles from my house at the time.

Joy lived several blocks from there when she was growing up. She remembers.

[MendoDave]

[1.21GW]

So, since quitting my job last May and traveling south I've had a lot of time to read.  Thirty-six books so far.  Gives me a good chance to read things that I've always been meaning to get to, but never had the time.  Case in point: I just finished White Noise by Don DeLillo.  My first DeLillo (read 1/4 of Underworld a decade ago and then lost interest).  Good book, but not as great as some have claimed.  Still, DeLillo definitely presaged (in 1985) the malaise brought on by technology that is now more common.

A few of the best books from my last ten months, in case anyone is looking for something:

- I re-read Lolita (Nabokov) and Unbearable Lightness... (Kundera) and both were better than I remembered.  Probably because this time around reading I am an actual adult.  Also, Nabokov is one hell of a prose stylist.
- Art is Propoganda (Orwell): good collection of essays by the most ardent opponent of power. Homage to Catalonia was an another good Orwell read, if you're a fan of Europe circa WWII.
- The Looming Tower (Wright): the story of Bin Laden and 9/11 hijackers as seen from US Intelligence
- The Victim's Revolution (Bower): no comment (politics!), but I'll say that I'm glad I'm not in college these days
- The Great Shark Hunt (Thompson): good collection of gonzo essays by the man himself

[Slide Panda]

36 Books? Go you!

[Jaman]

Just finished 'Anger is an Energy: My Life Uncensored' by Johnny Lydon - great read, but obviously not for everybody!

reading 'The Endurance: Shackelton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition' by Caroline Alexander - loving it, a lot of amazing pictures to go along with the telling of an epic tale!

[1.21GW]

Just finished 'Anger is an Energy: My Life Uncensored' by Johnny Lydon - great read, but obviously not for everybody!

reading 'The Endurance: Shackelton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition' by Caroline Alexander - loving it, a lot of amazing pictures to go along with the telling of an epic tale!

I read Endurance by Alfred Lansing a few years ago.  Same story, nearly same title.  I couldn't put it down.  We are all mere mortals compared to that troop of men... 

[Duck-Stew]

Just finished this: ^^

Am now onto this one:



Then:

[1.21GW]

I'm finally tackling Moby Dick.  I've read a lot of mixed reviews on this classic.  We'll see how it goes...

[Blackout]

I was in 9th grade when this Shiite went down.

[Jaman]

reading 'Fingerprints of the Gods' by Graham Hancock...

fascinating read!  not so sure about the premise, he makes some compelling arguments tho!

From Wiki:

Thesis[edit]

Quetzalcoatl as depicted in the Codex Magliabechiano.
The book pivots on "fingerprints" of allegedly influenced civilizations, evidence of which Hancock finds in the descriptions of Godmen like Osiris, Thoth, Quetzalcoatl, and Viracocha. These creation myths predate history, and Hancock suggests that in 10,450 BC, a major pole shift took place, before which Antarctica lay farther from the South Pole than today, and after which it shifted to its present location. This earlier civilization theoretically centered on Antarctica, and later survivors built the Olmec, Aztec, Maya and Egyptian civilizations.

Hancock was influenced by Rose and Rand Flem-Ath's When the Sky Fell: in Search of Atlantis (1995/2009), in which they expand the evidence for Charles Hapgood's theory of earth-crust displacement and propose Antarctica as the site of Atlantis.

The pole-shift hypothesis hinges on Charles Hapgood's theory of Earth Crustal Displacement.[2] Hapgood had a fascination with the story of Atlantis and suggested that crustal displacement may have caused its destruction. His theories have few supporters in the geological community compared to the more widely accepted model of plate tectonics.

[Grampa]

I was just talking to students about pole shifts this morning.

[GK]

I'm reading Miracles by Eric Metaxas.

[Jaman]

Eight Little Piggies: Reflections in Natural History by Stephen Jay Gould

Really Really good book...  had a bit of a slow start (I had to put the book down every few  pages, as I was having to reread so much and look up too many great big multisyllabic words, eyes glazing over, etc) but settling in now & really enjoying author's style, wit, & insights into his views on evolution of Life on this Great Big Ball!  (and expanding my vocabulary to boot!)

[Blackout]

[Blackout]

Great book about the tragedy of 9-11 focusing on the twin towers, the people inside them and the horribly frustrating lack of communication between FDNY and NYPD. 
This topic still fvcks me up and probably always will.