What book are you reading?

Cuchulain of Muirthemne, by Isabella Gregory

 

You're right, I didn't see it.

 

Plan of Attack by Bob Woodward.

 

I'm currently read "The End" by Ian Kershaw. It looks at the final days of the Third Reich and tries to answer why Germany fought to the bitter end.

 

Just finished Wahoo by Admiral Richard O'Kane.

Incredible story...and another sub lost (with all hands) due to one of her own malfunctioning torpedoes.

 

I've been listening to the audiobook, The Complete Essays of Montaigne - translated by Donald M. Frame; narrated by Christopher Lane. It's a jewel!!! I'm so impressed with the audio version that I also ordered the book. No - I'm not an "intellectual". I just like really well crafted literature. Montaigne is a doorway into not only the classical 16th century and it's prevalent philosophical perspectives - it's a doorway into understanding ourselves as human beings. His writings are timeless.

 

I'm reading " What it is like to go to war.by Karl Marlantes.I can relate to the book.I'm a Vietnam Vet>

 

Crichton's State of Fear..about halfway through now.

 

The Most Dangerous Superstition by Larken Rose. I agreed with the great reviews at Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Most-Dangerou...F8&qid=1362179834&sr=1-1&keywords=larken+rose
Rose makes a case that faith in Big Brother statism is more dangerous than organized religions with their faith in God.

 

Extinction by Mark Alpert

Pretty good!

 

Foreign Legion by Victor Fink.

It takes place in WW 1 in the Western Front.

 

Just got this book. I havent started yet but i hear it is really good.

 

Wise mans' fear - pretty darn good fiction.

 

Ulysses S. Grant's Personal Memoirs.

 

The Litigators, by John Grisham. Extremely funny and without the unnecessary downer ending he usually gives to his books. He's got comic pacing right too, not telling you why the dog is named AC until the unexplained name is mentioned a dozen times

 

And the Grapes of Wrath ,I would put as the greatest Novel of 20th century American literature from Steinbeck must be great.

i think if our friend meets a word more then 2 syllabals they are in trouble ,i would recomend ,Crime and Punishment after the Bros'Karma.

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And the Grapes of Wrath ,I would put as the greatest Novel of 20th century American literature from steinbeck must be great.

i think if our friend meets a word more then 2 syllabals they are in trouble ,i would recomend ,Crime and Punishment after the Bros'Kama.

 

Leon Trotsky's History of the Russian Revolution ,still banned in most Nations including my own.

 

"Wise Men" by Stuart Nadler

A story of a young Jewish boy (17 years old) coming of age in the 50's, falling for a black girl. Also his family dynamics....a drunken father who became famous and rich over night and taking the family from rags to riches quickly. The mother and "prejudiced" father as the "new rich" went bonkers buying everying in sight.....but still weren't happy. In fact not as happy as in their old home, neighborhood and life. The boy longed to go back to the neighborhood before they had money. Only 1/2 way finished, but it's a good read so far.

JP5

 

Why is it banned? I read his biography.

 

In Australia the literature of the communist movement was banned when an attempt was made by the Menzies government to ban the Communist Party in the 1950's,prior to that ,in the depression ,publications by Leon Trotsky ,Revolution betrayed ,history of russian revolution ,ect had to be smuggled in and found an audience amongst workers on the waterside.

These bans in relation to the literature of Leon Trotsky have not been lifted to this day ,Ineffective as the mass distribution and establishment of a section of the 4th International has been achieved by the australian working class.

But never the less still on the banned list ,I don't make a big deal out of it ,but when i have to go to court I will swear on the history of the russian Revolution as an amusment to me .

Read trotsky's autobiography 'My Life' and History is well read it and change the human you are!

 

I'm reading "A History of Ancient Britain" by the Scottish archaeologist, historian and TV presenter Neil Oliver, which is based on his BBC documentary TV series of the same name.



Who were the first Britons, and what sort of world did they occupy? In A HISTORY OF ANCIENT BRITAIN Neil Oliver turns a spotlight on the very beginnings of the story of Britain; on the first people to occupy these islands and their battle for survival.

There has been human habitation in Britain, regularly interrupted by Ice Ages, for the best part of a million years. The last retreat of the glaciers 12,000 years ago brought a new and warmer age and with it, one of the greatest tsunamis recorded on Earth which struck the north-east of Britain, devastating the population and flooding the low-lying plains of what is now the North Sea. The resulting island became, in time, home to a diverse range of cultures and peoples who have left behind them some of the most extraordinary and enigmatic monuments in the world.

Through what is revealed by the artefacts of the past, Neil Oliver weaves the epic story - half -a-million years of human history up to the departure of the Roman Empire in the Fifth Century AD. It was a period which accounts for more than ninety-nine per cent of humankind's presence on these islands.

It is the real story of Britain and of her people.
**************************************

Neil Oliver's History of Ancient Britain is infused with his love and fascination for the subject - while gentle touches of philosophy and ample good humour abound. For all that, it is a serious (but very readable) work - the best I have read in terms of bringing sense and meaning to British pre-history. The book starts and concludes with concepts of time and the need to look back to understand where we have come from and why we are who/what we are. And what a concept of time - back to the `commencement' of everything, a universe "at once incomprehensibly huge and yet - since it is expanding into and inside nothing at all - immeasurably small." Oliver has the good grace and humour to acknowledge that no-one can really deliver this concept with a straight face or understand it! He soon settles into the confines of what became Britain, taking us through the extraordinary time spans of the various stone ages, beyond the mega-tsunami that separated Britain from the continent, to the late Neolithic and Bronze Age. Oliver's description of the magic of liquid bronze is pure poetry - "like a glimpse of what must happen inside the heart of a star ... the living metal draws your breath towards it and consumes that as well, so that you gasp." Imagine the impact such an event, a first pouring of bronze, must have had on our Bronze Age ancestors. This history is beautifully written and takes you up in the sweep of events (but always at a human level) across the length and breadth of Britain through to the invasion and eventual retreat of the Romans. A wonderful book. Thoroughly recommended.


Neil Oliver with the beautiful Battersea Shield in the British Museum, London. The shield, dating from between 350BC to 50BC, was found in the Thames in 1857. This moment, where Neil comes face to face with the shield, is described by him in the book. He describes how he was visibly shaking - mainly with fear in case he damaged it - when given permission to touch the priceless artefact.

 

It's ironic to recall Australia publishing "Spycatcher" which Thatcher had had banned in Britain...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spycatcher

 

NY Times review:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/24/b...ers-by-glenn-frankel.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0


I watched the movie for the first time in many years and it was just awesome.