Now reading...

[David Ayers]

7 hours ago, Marzz said:

Just finished reading The Tempest from this new hernia inducing 'book'. It's a facsimile of Shakespeare's first folio (Norton). Definitely didn't need any more Shakespeare, but my wife knew I'd love it anyway and bought it for me for xmas! 

Nice. Wish I’d got the time but - well, the day job...

[Brad]

Soldiers of Salamis, a novel of the Spanish Civil War, by Javier Cercas. It reads like non fiction but is actually fiction.

Edited February 4, 2020 by Brad

[mjazzg]

1 hour ago, Brad said:

Soldiers of Salamis, a novel of the Spanish Civil War, by Javier Cercas. It reads like non fiction but is actually fiction.

I remember being very taken with that one but can't remember much detail.

[Brad]

Just now, mjazzg said:

I remember being very taken with that one but can't remember much detail.

It’s a story about an important Falange prisoner in Barcelona who in the final days of the War is to be executed, he runs away, a Republican soldier spares his life and he manages to survive in the forest, with the aid of a few “forest friends,” three Republican soldiers who have deserted. I’m about halfway through the book. 

[mjazzg]

4 hours ago, Brad said:

It’s a story about an important Falange prisoner in Barcelona who in the final days of the War is to be executed, he runs away, a Republican soldier spares his life and he manages to survive in the forest, with the aid of a few “forest friends,” three Republican soldiers who have deserted. I’m about halfway through the book. 

Thanks Brad. I nearly wrote in my first response the words "Falange" and "forest" but wasn't sure it was that one. It was. Different cover in the UK didn't help. I do remember it being a good read.

Hope you enjoy the rest of it

[Marzz]

On 2/4/2020 at 4:45 PM, Matthew said:

Love the look of the book! I've always had trouble reading a facsimile of the first folio, I'm impressed you can make it through without any headaches!

Oh definitely a few headaches for me, especially with the original pronunciation! I've grown up with the 'modern' versions, so i translate as i read along. I'd love to see a production with original pronunciation some day.

Edited February 4, 2020 by Marzz

[ghost of miles]

On 3/14/2019 at 8:32 AM, Brad said:

Did you read the recent one where he revisits The Spy Who Came In From the Cold and Smiley makes a brief appearance. I didn't read a lot of the early books and have started to read them found them very good, such as Call for the Dead and A Murder of Quality. Among the ones I have read over the years, Little Drummer Girl and The Russia House stand out. 

Thanks for these recs, Brad. Watching Smiley’s People has got me on another le Carre jag. Just resumed reading Adam Sisman’s bio as well. I have to confess that I bogged down with A Perfect Spy but will try returning to it too. Intrigued by an earlier Smiley novel, The Looking Glass War... how’s that one, if you’ve read it?

[jlhoots]

[erwbol]

Re-reading Adam Hochschild's King Leopold's Ghost in this Folio Society edition, bought in last month's sale (50% off).

[soulpope]

[Brad]

6 hours ago, erwbol said:

Re-reading Adam Hochschild's King Leopold's Ghost in this Folio Society edition, bought in last month's sale (50% off).

Excellent book. I love all of Hochschild’s books. 

6 hours ago, ghost of miles said:

Thanks for these recs, Brad. Watching Smiley’s People has got me on another le Carre jag. Just resumed reading Adam Sisman’s bio as well. I have to confess that I bogged down with A Perfect Spy but will try returning to it too. Intrigued by an earlier Smiley novel, The Looking Glass War... how’s that one, if you’ve read it?

I liked it.  It came out after the Spy Who Came in From the Cold and in his intro to the newest edition, LeCarte notes that professionals thought it ringed true to life, although the book wasn’t well received by critics at the time. It shows a faded and bumbling agency trying to recover past glory. 

[Matthew]

With Head and Heart: The Autobiography of Howard Thurman

[Dan Gould]

https://lsupress.org/assets/images/book-covers/12496.jpg

 

Just finishing this one up definitely gets an overall recommendation though with a few caveats:  There are a lot - make that a ton - of paragraphs that simply list out Slim gigs in different years based on advertising he found in local papers.  Maybe necessary but honestly a little goes a long way.

Very good for pretty detailed info, as available, on the other musicians in the area, those who played and didn't play with Slim, a definite plus. At the same time I found his critical opinions questionable. Basically almost no one but Harpo, Lightnin' and Lazy Lester had any real skill, in this author's opinion. And he hates on the late 60s - early 70s recordings that featured a lot of those guys like Silas Hogan. 

(Does anyone else like the Lightnin' Slim recording made with a horn section? London Gumbo? Somehow I enjoy that one quite a bit)

[Brad]

This is a remarkable book about the horrors imposed on the Lithuanian people. The novel, which is told through the eyes of a 16 year old girl (and was meticulously researched by the author) recounts how she and her family are forced into a Russian prison camp and the privations they suffer, especially when they are moved to a second camp at the edge of the Arctic Circle. The conditions under which they lived are indescribable. It would be 12 years before they would be allowed to go home. Although the book is said to be fiction, what the Russians did to Lithuania is terribly true. 

[soulpope]

[ejp626]

In the midst of a mini-Russian/Ukraine marathon.  I just read Voinovich's The Life & Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin and the sequel Pretender to the Throne.  Both are amusing, though I thought the first was better, whereas the second one spends almost all its time tracking how others in the Soviet system are dealing with Ivan Chonkin.

The library happens to have A Displaced Person, which is the last in the Chonkin trilogy.  I'll read it soon, but need a bit of a break.

 

Now I'm working on Andrei Kurkov's Death and the Penguin (which I read about 12-13 years ago) and the sequel, Penguin Lost, which will be new to me.

 

 

[soulpope]

[Big Beat Steve]

On 12.2.2020 at 7:07 PM, Dan Gould said:

https://lsupress.org/assets/images/book-covers/12496.jpg

 

Just finishing this one up definitely gets an overall recommendation though with a few caveats:  There are a lot - make that a ton - of paragraphs that simply list out Slim gigs in different years based on advertising he found in local papers.  Maybe necessary but honestly a little goes a long way.

Very good for pretty detailed info, as available, on the other musicians in the area, those who played and didn't play with Slim, a definite plus. At the same time I found his critical opinions questionable. Basically almost no one but Harpo, Lightnin' and Lazy Lester had any real skill, in this author's opinion. And he hates on the late 60s - early 70s recordings that featured a lot of those guys like Silas Hogan. 

(Does anyone else like the Lightnin' Slim recording made with a horn section? London Gumbo? Somehow I enjoy that one quite a bit)

Would you perhaps like to put your post in the What Jazz Book Are You Reading section? It might get some more attention there and would not be out of place there at all.

[Brad]

Having finished Soldiers of Salamis, which was outstanding, I have now begun his latest Lord of All the Dead, about Javier Cercas’ uncle who was killed in the Civil War. 

I have also picked up Toni Morrison’s Home. This is my first time reading anything by her.

Edited February 18, 2020 by Brad

[soulpope]

[jlhoots]

Susan Orlean: The Library Book

[Brad]

15 hours ago, jlhoots said:

Susan Orlean: The Library Book

I’ve heard a lot of good things about this book. 

[Dave James]

On 2/7/2020 at 9:55 AM, soulpope said:

OFF TOPIC WARNING:  Is it just me, or does this picture of Liszt look something like Vincent Kartheiser, the actor who played Pete Campbell on "Mad Men?"

Edited February 20, 2020 by Dave James

[soulpope]

[Matthew]

Judgement Day by Penelope Lively