Books, y'all.

[ProfessorPangloss]

As an English teacher, I've enjoyed reading everyone's posts of "I sat down with X book, Y tobacco, and Z alcoholic beverage and had a great / average / transcendent evening." One of the most enjoyable things about my nursery job last summer was that when it *really* rained (ie. drove off the customers), I could hunker down on the clock in our little shack with a pipe and some Hunter S. Thompson. I also read John Barth's The Sot-Weed Factor that way, which is tons of fun if you like a challenging, ribald, and plot-twisting novel at least somewhat about tobacco and early America.

The irony of teaching English is that I generally, for at least 9 months a year, spend my "free" time at night reading poorly-written student work and making comments that go unrecognized and wasted. So right now, in my free-r time, I read as much as I can.

Ok, I'll start. No book shaming here. If you want to read the Twilight series and knock off a stogie, you're a free human being.

I'm reading All Over but the Shoutin' by Rick Bragg. It's the memoir by Pulitzer prize winner of his very hard young life in rural Alabama in the sixties and seventies. Great Southern prose styling, descriptions, and characters. I'm about halfway through and recommend it highly.

who's next?

 

[Jitterbugdude]

I am finishing the book "The First War of Physics". It is about the research/development/race that took place prior to and during WW2 to develop the first nuclear bomb.

 

[Knucklehead]

I devour books. I read so fast I have to keep reading books over and over until I can afford more. I usually keep one or two going at all times. I started Stephen Hawkings A Brief History of Time and got about half finished before I read Michael Crichton's The Andromeda Strain in a day, then started his The Terminal Man. I will probably finish it then start back on Hawking. Next up is a book Deluxestogie recommended several months ago Lawrence and Oppenheimer by Nuel Pharr Davis. My favorite book of all time is Scott's Ivanhoe. I've read that book at least once a year since High School (graduated 1980) and have read two copies to tatters. I'm now on my third book. I read everything I can get my hands on from comic books to text books. I can't get enough. (I still have all my old superhero comics from the 60's, 70's and 80's. I have some rare comics except I've read them so many times they are far from pristine).

 

[Knucklehead]

I am finishing the book "The First War of Physics". It is about the research/development/race that took place prior to and during WW2 to develop the first nuclear bomb.

Thanks. Just added to my Amazon Wish List.

 

[ProfessorPangloss]

Thanks. Just added to my Amazon Wish List.

Man, if you're into that, let me also mention American Prometheus- the bio of J. Robert Oppenheimer.

 

[Jitterbugdude]

Best place to get books is " Abe books". They are a gigantic conglomeration of ma and pa type book stores.
http://www.abebooks.com/

 

[ProfessorPangloss]

Also, betterworldbooks.com. They donate a book for every one you buy, and they do carbon-neutral shipping for $.02, so most books I buy on there total to exactly $4.
http://www.betterworldbooks.com/

 

[Smokin Harley]

I just finished "Cigars Whiskey and Winning, lessons in leadership taken from the diary of Ulysses S Grant."

I recommend everyone read it . Especially those people whose job puts them in charge of others and decision making positions.

 

[deluxestogie]

Yesterday, I finished reading The Emerald Mile: The Epic Story of the Fastest Ride in History Through the Heart of the Grand Canyon, by Kevin Fedarko (2014). This non-fiction thriller about the Colorado River boatmen in the Grand Canyon, and the hydrologic crisis in 1983 that came within a hair's breadth of destroying Glen Canyon Dam (and instantly dumping the entire contents of Lake Powell--the longest reservoir in the world--into Grand Canyon), touches on the history of the Canyon, from its "discovery" by the Spanish, through John Wesley Powell's 1869 wild expedition of the entire Colorado River, to the boom in the Bureau of Reclamation's hydro-power dam building--and on to today. Along the way, we read of the campaign to prevent the building of two additional hydro-electric dams within Grand Canyon National Park. ("Visitors to the Rim would hardly notice them.")

Bob

 

[webmost]

... I also read John Barth's The Sot-Weed Factor that way, which is tons of fun if you like a challenging, ribald, and plot-twisting novel at least somewhat about tobacco and early America.

How wondrous a vocabulary
Is it that possesseth nary
Noun nor verb the rhyme for which'll
Stump the son of Captain Mitchell

 

[ProfessorPangloss]

How wondrous a vocabulary
Is it that possesseth nary
Noun nor verb the rhyme for which'll
Stump the son of Captain Mitchell

Very nice

 

[Jitterbugdude]

Just started another book. "Washington's Spies". It is about George Washington's attempt to set up the first spy network in the Colonies, for the Continental Army. Quite an interesting read. Goes in to detail about Nathan Hale as well as the revolutionary (no pun intended) techniques Washington's spies developed. For instance, up till Washington's spy ring the standard protocol for spying was to go over to the enemy, make some quick observations and then get the hell back to your own lines, usually within 24 hours or so. Washington's spies developed the protocol where you send a spy into the enemy's arena, blend in, become one of the locals and stay for an extended period.

 

[ProfessorPangloss]

I finished All Over but the Shoutin' yesterday and started on the Pevear translation of The Three Musketeers. ​It's been staring at me from the shelf for ages, and summer is when I can read big books.

 

[Hasse SWE]

I finished All Over but the Shoutin' yesterday and started on the Pevear translation of The Three Musketeers. ​It's been staring at me from the shelf for ages, and summer is when I can read big books.

Funny for me it's more a winter thing to read books.. The latest 5-6 year it have been most tobacco books, but even crime story's and offcourse children books

 

[LewZephyr]

Professor,
How was All Over but the Shoutin'?
I heard a good interview with him on NPR. Sounded like it would be good.

 

[ProfessorPangloss]

It was good. Better in the beginning, and the writing is a little self-indulgent aw-shucks poor white Southern, but the man speaks the truth. There's one chapter written to Bragg's dad directly in the second person that I would have dropped if I were the publisher, but I'm not a publisher. Worth the read for sure. It's quick if you're not always dropping it to chase a toddler like I am.

I'm enjoying the heck out of Three Musketeers. It was published serially, so there's always something to keep you in suspense. Sometimes I get tired of novelists who leave you in a hundred-page doldrum of nothing in the middle of the book.

 

[Knucklehead]

Sometimes I get tired of novelists who leave you in a hundred-page doldrum of nothing in the middle of the book.

I agree with that. Some novels would make much better short stories.

 

[deluxestogie]

Over the years, my experience in critiquing or editing hundreds of unpublished (or yet to be published) short stories and novels, by scores of writers (both professional and novice), has left me with the impression that the mind of an individual writer imagines stories best in either a short form or long form, but but that an individual writer is seldom good at both. In a sense, it's like the comparison of a musician who thinks in terms of a melody, versus one who thinks in the context of symphonic orchestration.

If a writer envisions a literary "symphony," it's damn near impossible to squeeze that into a short story. If, instead, he or she conceives a simple notion of an event, a "melody" if you will, then the challenge of expanding that to the length of a novel requires an unusual depth of creativity to weave the whole fabric.

Some writers have found financial success in combining the two. For example, James A. Michener's huge "novels," including The Source, Tales of the South Pacific (basis for the musical, South Pacific), Caribbean, Hawaii, and many more, are actually just chronologically assembled collections of short stories that share a theme--often with an overarching "narrator."

As is apparent from many of my FTT posts, I find brevity challenging.

Bob

 

[dvick003]

There are several book series that I read every year. For some reason, C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien really resonate with me. I read The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, Mere Christianity and the Abolition of Man almost every year. I find that I need constant reminding of some things in my life... The Lord of the Rings and the Chronicles of Narnia remind me of my duty and love to family, friends, and putting others needs ahead of your own. Mere Christianity keeps me grounded in what I know to be true but let slide to the back of my mind at times...

 

[dvick003]

That may be why I like pipes and cigars so much... I just feel like a fellow at Oxford or Cambridge when I am enjoying a good smoke.