The "what are you reading" thread:

[Lorizael]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Horus Rising

Editorial Reviews

Book Description
After thousands of years of expansion and conquest, the human Imperium is at its height. His dream for humanity accomplished, the Emperor hands over the reins of power to his Warmaster, Horus, and heads back to Terra. But is Horus strong enough to control his fellow commanders and continue the Emperor's grand design, or will such incredible power corrupt him?

I wonder how it ends!

[Lord Avalon]

Recently saw the Count of Monte Cristo remake. Kept saying, that's not right! That's not what happened! So I reread the book.

Recently finished Turtledove's Settling Accounts: In at the Death.

Also been reading the Modesty Blaise compilations of the old newspaper strips.

[Arrian]

I just finished Catastrophe - An Investigation into the Origins of the Modern World (David Keys). Laz mentioned it over in the history forum and it sounded interesting.

It is interesting, even if the author jumps a tad too easily to his conclusions. He's way too loose with words like "clearly" and "undoubtedly" and whatnot. I think he stretches the evidence. I think his theory about the plague (535 AD volcanic eruption -> climate disruption -> eruption of plague) is interesting and possible. The chapter on the rise of Islam seems really a stretch. I wasn't convinced regarding the migration of the Avars, either.

-Arrian

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by lord of the mark
...Satanic Verses is on my to read list . . .

A word of caution: I couldn't make it passed page 3.
It is unreadable.
So if you must read it, get if from the library or a friend. Do not spend any money on it.

[Varwnos]

The satanic verses must be one of the most undeservingly famous books. From what i recall i found it to be little more than extremely badly written, and did not read much of it at that..

I am slowly reading James's 'turn of the screw'.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Zkribbler
A word of caution: I couldn't make it passed page 3.
It is unreadable.
So if you must read it, get if from the library or a friend. Do not spend any money on it.

BULL****!

I just read it and it is absolutely incredible . Just a wonderfully written book, full of great florid language which really pulls you into the story. And a really amusing read about the differences between good and evil.

I highly recommend it.

[Krill]

This thread.

[Nikolai]

While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within by Bruce Bawer

From Publishers Weekly
Having recently published an indictment of Christian fundamentalist intolerance in the U.S. (Stealing Jesus), New York native Bawer relocated to Europe with his Norwegian partner in 1998 and found an even more dangerous strain of religious and cultural bigotry ensnaring Western Europe. A swarming menace called radical Islam, he writes, rings Europe's cities in smoldering Muslim ghettos, provoking everything from so-called honor killings and political assassinations to the Madrid subway bombings and the massacre of school children in Beslan. Worse, the Taliban-like theocracy Bawer sees looming inside backward immigrant populations resistant to integration flourishes under the protective wing of Western Europe's America-bashing, multicultural, liberal establishment. The latter correspond to the appeasers of Nazi Germany, in Bawer's view, since he believes that radical Islamism is every bit the threat to Western civilization that Nazism was. He scoffs at talk of "understanding" or "dialogue," indeed, at any but the most muscular response hitching Europe ever tighter to the U.S. war on terror. His clash-of-civilizations outlook means real issues often get washed away by sweeping statements designed to tar Europe's Muslims with one irredeemably hostile, welfare-sponging brush, while trading in well-worn stereotypes about virtuous American "realists" and corrupt European "idealists." (Mar.)

From Bookmarks Magazine
Bruce Bawer, who has wrestled previously about American fundamentalism (Stealing Jesus) and gay rights (A Place at the Table), finds an equally contentious and compelling subject in the blind eye of European liberalism. Enchanted by the famed tolerance of Amsterdam, Bawer moved to Europe in 1998. But after settling in a predominantly Muslim neighborhood, the author noticed a society that offered "millions in aid, but not a penny in salary." Reviewers find Bawer an eloquent writer with his passion balanced between his American sensibilities and his European residence. The sharpest criticism—that a lack of a bibliography turns While Europe Slept into an exercise in pamphleteering—doesn't undermine the ultimate effectiveness, or importance, of Bawer's thesis.

[Nostromo]

Originally posted by Zkribbler


A word of caution: I couldn't make it passed page 3.
It is unreadable.
So if you must read it, get if from the library or a friend. Do not spend any money on it.

Are you sure you bought the english version?

But the Satanic Verses is one of those books eveyone heard about but nobody read.

[Nikolai]

We have it somewhere at my parents'. I once opened the book, but it looked not very interesting.

[Nostromo]

Originally posted by Zkribbler
A word of caution: I couldn't make it passed page 3.
It is unreadable.
So if you must read it, get if from the library or a friend. Do not spend any money on it.

Originally posted by Varwnos
The satanic verses must be one of the most undeservingly famous books. From what i recall i found it to be little more than extremely badly written, and did not read much of it at that..

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui


BULL****!

I just read it and it is absolutely incredible . Just a wonderfully written book, full of great florid language which really pulls you into the story. And a really amusing read about the differences between good and evil.

I highly recommend it.

Comments about an author's style always crack me up.

[SpencerH]

The rise and fall of Theodore Rooseveldt by Edmond Morris. Brilliantly written. Dutch was very good too but I left it on a plane so havent quite finished it yet.

[SpencerH]

I'm also reading the last (I think) in the wheel of time series, Path of Daggers.

[Traianvs]

Perestroika by Gorbatchov

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Lorizael
I wonder how it ends!

It's the journey that is of importance. Not so much the destination.