Tell me what book you think I should read and I'll tell you what I think you should read.

[NNadir]

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. My dear NNadir!

Now, how can I do that?

I have no idea how your tastes run, and you have no idea about mine!

What kinds of things do you like to read?

:shrug:

[NNadir]

2. All the better. Maybe we're both stultified.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

3. Ah, maybe we are!

:hug:

[NNadir]

8. OK, I'll start.

I am going to retranslate some of the prologue of Hesse's Demian in a way I like:

"...No human being is merely a self, each is the singular, completely independent point at which views intersect as such just once, never to be repeated. In this way is the tale of every soul important, eternal and godly, in this way, so long as one actually lives and so fulfills the will of nature, is every tale remarkable and worthy of all attention. In each, a form of the spirit is reified, in each, the creator suffers, in each is a redeemer who is crucified..."

Your turn.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

12. Ack!

Excellent job!

Unfortunately, I am not up to translating anything!

I have always struggled to understand the philosophers...

And that is a lovely quote!

I got nothing...:blush:

[Political Heretic]

102. One of my favorite books.

[qwertyMike]

118. The Fan Man

by William Kotzwinkle.

http://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&tag=mozilla-20&index=blended&link%5Fcode=qs&field-keywords=The%20Fan%20Man&sourceid=Mozilla-search

Dorky, dorky, dorky

Mike

[NNadir]

119. "On the Road" Jack Kerouac.

[qwertyMike]

133. 1971

Jack Kerouac was born Jean-Louis Lebris de Kerouac, in Lowell, Massachusetts to French-Canadian parents, Léo-Alcide Kerouac and Gabrielle-Ange Lévesque, natives of the province of Québec, Canada. Like many other Quebecers of their generation, the Lévesques and Kerouacs were part of the Quebec emigration to New England to find employment.

Kerouac did not start to learn English until the age of six

[graywarrior]

4. The Sparrow

by Mary Doria Russell

About a Jesuit priest who travels to another planet. Awesome.

[NNadir]

10. I am going to recommend James Mitchner's "The Source"

It traces a family line in what is now modern Israel through several millenniums.

[graywarrior]

31. Thank you!

[Richardo]

90. "The Annotated Alice" by Martin Gardner

:thumbsup:

[ashling]

99. That was a great book

:hi:

[NNadir]

116. It was the first "grown up" novel I ever read.

I was 13.

It opened a whole new world for me.

[Pacifist Patriot]

33. That and the sequel were absolutely incredible!

[graywarrior]

36. You know, I have not read the sequel.

I need to get that. The Sparrow just blew me away it was such an amazing story. And I heard the Jesuits LOVE this book. The Jesuits-Hitmen of the Catholic Church.

[momophile]

66. you have good taste all over the place

The Sparrow AND Alan Rickman. Wow!

[cbayer]

91. Unbelievable book! One of my all time favorites.

So hard to describe. I did not like her second, "Children of God" nearly as much.

[Heidi]

5. Jackson Pollock: An American Saga, by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith

I came to this Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of expressionist painter Jackson Pollock about seven years after it was published, and it was a harrowing read, due primarily to the detailed account of Pollock's childhood, his downward spiral into alcoholism and his struggle to find his own voice as a painter. But it's beautifully written and well worth the investment of time and heart it takes to get through it.

:hi:

[NNadir]

14. John Coltrane, His Life and Times, by Louis Porter.

[Heidi]

15. Thank you!

This sounds like one I'd enjoy! :thumbsup:

[JVS]

6. Sinclair Lewis' Babbitt

[NNadir]

16. Joseph Heller's "Something Happened."

A jaded man rises through the corporate world, hates his wife and daughter, but loves his son to whom he accidentally does a horrible thing.

[Dinger]

7. The Man Called Cash By Steve Turner

Great book!

[NNadir]

56. "Coal Miner's Daughter" Loretta Lynn

[u4ic]

9. My Pet Goat

It comes highly recommended by a very important man.

[NNadir]

13. John Wheeler's "Gravitation"

It's about stuff that sucks other stuff into black holes.

[Ptah]

11. Peter Bowen - Coyote Wind (Gabriel Du Pre, book 1)

[NNadir]

18. I recommend Malcomn Lowry's "Under the Volcano."

It's the last day of the life of an alcoholic consular official in Mexico.

[Adsos Letter]

17. "Habits of the Heart" edited by Robert Bellah...

[NNadir]

19. homas W Shields, Joseph LoCicero, Ronald B Ponn, and Valerie W Rusch;s

General Thoracic Surgery (2 Vol. Set), a bargain at $299.

[Heidi]

20. !

:rofl:

[Adsos Letter]

21. Ya' know...

my oldest daughter is just finishing her second year of medical school, and starts her surgery rotations in the fall... :D

[Adsos Letter]

22. ...AAAUUUUGGGGHHHH... !

...it took Heidi's uncontrollable mirth to clue me in on the joke... :blush:

I am so dense sometimes... :D

[Heidi]

24. I've only read the first four pages of the Lounge today, but NNadir's recommendation to you

is absolutely the funniest thing I've read here in days. :rofl:

:hug: <-- Here, have a hug.

[Adsos Letter]

25. ...*sigh*...I'm always the last to know...

:rofl:


Here...have a lazy cat: :D





she rents me this computer space in return for catfood (delivered) and pats. :hug:

[Heidi]

26. Your kitty is just beautiful!

The Wiley and Excellent Boy Cat Named Ginger would no doubt find her highly attractive, if not for the surgical procedure which rendered him more snuggle-bunny than playboy. :P

[Adsos Letter]

27. "Mewie" (we make no pretense of originality around here)

is almost 19 years old...she does a lot of that sleeping these days...

Here is her much younger nemesis and perennial thorn-in-the-flesh, Cosette: :D

[Heidi]

29. I love those kitty names!

We have a bunch of weird cat names, most of which mean absolutely nothing and/or are just made up names. :blush:
My mother-in-law's cats: Mins, Bünz and Tabitha
My sister-in-law's cats: Sumi and Barley
And our male cat named "Ginger" :rofl:

[SeattleGirl]

23. "Broken Government" by John Dean

Great read.

[NNadir]

53. "What's the Matter with Kansas?" by Thomas Frank.

[DS1]

28. Cryptonomicon

just to shut you up for a bit :P

[NNadir]

49. Water Lord's "Midway."

[taterguy]

30. Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung by Lester Bangs

[NNadir]

52. I will either recommend one of those tedious hagiographies of the Rolling Stones,

or if you want to read a good book that is about the title evoked, Katie Avord's Divorce Your Car." Alvord's book is one of the best environmental books I've ever read.

[taterguy]

104. Thanks for the suggestion

Sure hope my library has it

My car and I had a very amicable parting of the ways back in 1993

[mitchum]

113. I refer to the ones specifically about Keith as "skagiographies"...

I must confess that I actually collect books about The Rolling Stones. For me, part of their appeal is their formalism and predictability- "rock and roll bad boys", "demonic energy", "tapping into the darkside", "carnal delights", "Luciferean appeal", "pansexuality", blah, blah, blah...all the pat phrases one knows that one will encounter :)

[MrCoffee]

32. Random Acts of Senseless Violence by Jack Womack

[NNadir]

55. Burgess's "A Clockwork Orange."

[geardaddy]

34. Welcome to the Monkey House.

[FloridaJudy]

38. Just check out GD-P

[geardaddy]

39. LOL

No, that's a book of short stories by Kurt Vonnegut.

[NNadir]

43. I assume you've read Slaughterhouse Five.

I recommend Hesse's "Steppenwolf," but you have to read it in German.

If you don't know German, you should learn it. It will be good for you.

[meegbear]

35. "Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds" by Charles Mackay

[NNadir]

44. Marshall McLuhan's "From Cliche to Archetype."

Somebody has to read McLuhan. It might as well be you.

[FloridaJudy]

37. "Practical Demonkeeping" by Christopher Moore

[NNadir]

86. Goethe's "Faust"

[applegrove]

40. Read "A Fine Balance" by Rohinton Mistry

[NNadir]

46. E.M. Forester's "A Passage to India."

[applegrove]

51. I've never read it. Good idea.

[tigereye]

41. Animal Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver

esp. if you are interested in the "slow food" movement. Nice book.

[NNadir]

50. Sinclair Lewis's "The Jungle."

[tigereye]

89. I have actually never read that...

says the embarrassed English major... ;)

[Sacajawea]

94. IIRC, I believe it was Upton Sinclair who wrote "The Jungle", not Sinclair Lewis

As a 44+ year vegetarian, I've never been able to get myself to read "The Jungle", however.

[WinkyDink]

42. "The Day of the Jackal".

[NNadir]

47. Jerzy Kosinski's "Cockpit."

[WinkyDink]

112. I've read some Kosinski; not this one, though.

[Critters2]

45. Willa Cather's _O Pioneers!_ My favorite novel! nt

[NNadir]

48. McLaughlin's "Sarah, Plain and Tall."

It is thought of as a child's book, but it is not.

[JVS]

58. This novel led to a dispute that nearly tore apart my 11th grade English class

[NNadir]

59. If anything recommends a book, that statement does.

[Critters2]

60. About what? nt

[JVS]

100. The teacher claimed that there was an element of accident in the double murder at the end.

My best friend claimed that one does not accidentally shoot two people through the heart at range with a bolt-action rifle. The scoffing was uproarious.

[Critters2]

150. I'd be scoffing, too.

Trust me, that was no accident!!

[JVS]

156. Yeah. One of my friends was saying "have you ever even fired a gun? That's not how an accident goes"

[lightningandsnow]

54. "Whipping Girl" by Julia Serano.

I love this book. It's amazing.

http://www.juliaserano.com/whippinggirl.html

[NNadir]

57. "Our Lady of the Flowers" Jean Genet.

[Flaxbee]

61. "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life" by Barbara Kingsolver

great book, actually.

What's your suggestion? :hi:

[NNadir]

62. I recommended Sinclair Lewis's "The Jungle" above but in this case I'll recommend

George Orwell's Animal Farm.

[RainDog]

71. oops! upton sinclair - I get the two names confused all the time n/t

[NNadir]

84. I stand corrected. I should read and remember more.

[nickgutierrez]

63. The Mystery Science Theater 3000 Amazing Colossal Guide

The only reason it's on my mind is that I just ordered it from the internets.

Your turn. :)

[NNadir]

69. Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut.

[Tikki]

64. John Okada's .......No-No Boy..

An excellent book...




Tikki

[NNadir]

70. John Hershey's "Hiroshima"

[triguy46]

65. The Good Soldier, Ford Madox Ford

[NNadir]

73. "For Whom The Bell Tolls" Ernie Hemingway.

[triguy46]

76. Wrong. Try again. Cannot do Papa. I refuse.

[NNadir]

81. OK then. You're stuck with Ondaatje's "The English Patient." If you keep being contrary...

I'll be forced to recommend Ishiguro's "Remains of the Day."

[NNadir]

82. OK then. You're stuck with Ondaatje's "The English Patient." If you keep being contrary...

I'll be forced to recommend Ishiguro's "Remains of the Day."

[triguy46]

85. I'll take "The English Patient." It will be a reread.

[NNadir]

87. I hope I haven't let you down. Sometimes a reread is a good thing.

A great book is one where you read it two or three times, and still discover what you didn't know.

[triguy46]

88. Prob 25% of my reading is reread. Thanks.

[Connonym]

124. Curious why you won't read Hemmingway

I've got a visceral dislike of him. I don't care for his writing but my dislike for him goes beyond that, I can't even explain exactly what it is.

[triguy46]

128. I think it personal rather than artistic. Just don't like him based on ...

reading of literary experiences in Paris, etc. I have no $64 answer. Maybe I just don't have room for him in my stable of authors.

[Connonym]

155. yeah, yeah

that's sort of how I am too. Just kind of a gut level unexplainable feeling of ick about him as a person. I've never been able to figure out what it was. I had to read Old Man and the Sea and I thought it was pretty unspectacular but my dislike of Hemmingway doesn't really have anything to do with that. Anyway, I don't mean to go on and on about it, it's just weird to me because you're the only other person I've encountered who feels the same way.

[momophile]

67. American Taboo

about a murder of one Peace Corps volunteer by another one. True story.

[NNadir]

74. Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness."

[zingaro]

68. Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. nt

[NNadir]

75. H.G. Wells "The Invisible Man."

[RainDog]

72. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle n/t

[NNadir]

78. Yukio Mishima's "Confessions of a Mask."

[Xipe Totec]

77. The Dancing Wu Li Masters n/t

[NNadir]

80. Wolfgang Pauli's "General Relativity."

[Forkboy]

79. The Years of Rice and Salt

Best book I've ever read. It gave me so many things to ponder I had to read it twice, and a third go 'round is on the horizon.



The book is set between about A.D. 1405 (783 solar years since the Hegira, by the Islamic calendar used in the book), and A.D. 2002 (1423 after Hegira). In the eighth Islamic century, almost 99% of the population of Medieval Europe is wiped out by the Black Death (rather than the approximately 30-60% that died in reality). This sets the stage for a world without Christianity as a major influence.

The novel follows a jāti of three to seven main characters and their reincarnation through the centuries in very different cultural and religious settings. The book features Muslim, Chinese (Buddhist, Daoist, Confucianist), American Indian, and Hindu culture, philosophy and everyday life. It mixes sophisticated knowledge about these cultures in the real world with their imagined global development in a world without Western Christendom.

The main characters, marked by identical first letters throughout their reincarnations, but changing in gender, culture-nationality and so on, struggle for progress in each life. Each chapter has a narrative style which reflects its setting.

"My feeling is that until the number of whole lives is greater than the number of shattered lives, we remain stuck in some kind of prehistory, unworthy of humanity's great spirit. History as a story worth telling will only begin when the whole lives outnumber the wasted ones. That means we have many generations to go before history begins. All the inequalities must end; all the surplus wealth must be equitably distributed. Until then we are still only some kind of gibbering monkey, and humanity, as we usually like to think of it, does not yet exist."

"This is what the human story is, not the emperors and the generals and their wars, but the nameless actions of people who are never written down, the good they do for others passed on like a blessing..."

There's a segment called "Wealth and the Four Great Inequalities" that's as good most entire books are. :thumbsup: ... Big time!

[NNadir]

83. "The Plague," Albert Camus.

[Forkboy]

96. Deal.

:D

[cbayer]

92. Two for you. Can I get two back?

The Line of Beauty - Alan Hollingshurst
Set in England - about class, politics, drugs and sexuality. Wonderfully written.

The Swarm - Frank Schatzing
About the sea taking back control from the humans. Really frightening and profound in so many ways.

[NNadir]

105. #1. "The Great Gatsby" F. Scott Fitzgeral.

[NNadir]

106. #2. Jules Verne's "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea."

[cbayer]

127. thank you very much

Both of these are due for a re-read from me and they match my recommendations to you quite well.

[OmahaBlueDog]

93. "The Grapes of Wrath" by John Steinbeck

[NNadir]

107. T. Conan Boyle's "Tortilla Curtain."

Boyle's no Steinbeck, but he does pretty well with immigrants substituting for Okies.

[FloridaJudy]

95. Neal Stephenson's "Snow Crash" n/t

[Political Heretic]

101. Love that book!

[NNadir]

109. "The Beserker" by Fred Saberhagen.

[eppur_se_muova]

97. Aidan Hartley's "The Zanzibar Chest"

http://books.google.com/books?id=JnkDrezwYf4C&dq=zanzibar+chest&pg=PP1&ots=y8_QpxGefO&sig=lNJmWdo_t8DAm-dDKMzEMT_cnnc&hl=en&prev=http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=zanzibar+chest&btnG=Google+Search&sa=X&oi=print&ct=title&cad=one-book-with-thumbnail

A bit harrowing in places, but an astonishing read.

[NNadir]

108. Fyodor Dostoevsky's "The Possessed," sometimes translated as "The Devils."

I wish I could read Russian because I think that the translations, as great as they are, must only be shadows.

[XemaSab]

98. Into the Wild

:D

(When did you start chilling in teh longue? :shrug:)

[NNadir]

110. Jack London's "Call of the Wild."

Once in a while I show up in the lounge.

One can't be heavy all the time.

[Political Heretic]

103. Paul Tillich's Love Power and Justice.

:)

[NNadir]

111. Elaine Pagel's "The Origins of Satan."

[Political Heretic]

121. Read it! As well as the Gnostic Gospels. Can you give me something else?

[NNadir]

122. "Out of My Life and Thought" by Albert Schweitzer.

[Political Heretic]

125. oooo thanks :)

[mitchum]

114. Richard Price's "Ladies Man"...

the best urban novel of the past 30 years

[NNadir]

115. Manuel Puig's "Kiss of the Spider Woman"

[UrbScotty]

117. Everyday Leadership by Daniel Granholm Mulhern

(Husband of Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm)

Also, The 21 Indespensable Qualities of a Leader by John C. Masxwell.

[NNadir]

120. "A Team of Rivals" - Doris Kearns Goodwin.

It's on how Abraham Lincoln took his strongest rivals for the Presidency and both subdued and used them to save his country from disaster.

[LuckyLib]

123. The Saddest Pleasure by Moritz Thomsen

[NNadir]

126. I have already recommended Conrad's "The Heart of Darkness" for another book, so here I will

recommend, "A River No More," by Phillip Fradkin.

[knitter4democracy]

129. Master and Margarita, one of my faves.

Best modernist novel, hands-down. :)

[NNadir]

130. I am going to recommend a short story here.

Steven Benet's "The Devil and Daniel Webster."

[knitter4democracy]

157. I like that one, thanks!

I haven't read American lit in awhile. I should find my copy. :)

[Capn Sunshine]

131. The Martian Chronicles-Ray Bradbury

because everyone should.

[NNadir]

135. James Fenimore Cooper's "Last of the Mohicans."

I took "Martian Chronicles" out of my high school library when I was a kid. I must have read it 20 times before returning it.

[Capn Sunshine]

138. Is "On The Road" on this list?

I read the Mohican in 9th grade. Did NOT like the ending.

[ulysses]

132. Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver

[NNadir]

136. "At Play In the House of the Lord" by Peter Matthiessen.

[Fire Walk With Me]

134. "Titan" by Samuel R. Delany.

[NNadir]

137. Naturally Kurt Vonnegut's "The Sirens of Titan."

[jpak]

139. The Idiot's Guide to Nuclear Power

:nuke: :evilgrin: :nuke:

[Name removed]

141. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[jpak]

143. So what do you recommend for me?

:shrug:

[NNadir]

144. "My Pet Goat."

[jpak]

145. What an intellectually stimulating suggestion

:rofl:

[NNadir]

146. Given your level, I'm not surprised.

Don't stay up at night struggling over the big words.

[jpak]

147. My level? Please explain...

:shrug:

[Richardo]

140. "1776" by David McCullough

[NNadir]

142. Gary Wills "Lincoln at Gettysburg. The Words That Remade America."

[mikebl]

148. Temple of Gold

by William Goldman

[NNadir]

149. "Catcher in the Rye" by J.D. Salinger.

[Zephyrbird]

151. World Without End, by Ken Follett n/t

Z

[NNadir]

153. Umberto Eco, "The Name of the Rose."

[Zephyrbird]

158. Read it a long time ago! Got any others??

I loooooove to read.....

[NNadir]

159. It's not fiction, but you may wish to try "A Monk in the Garden" by Robin Marantz Henig.

It is a biography of Gregor Mendel, the father of genetics, who labored in obscurity as a monk/scientist.

[enigmatic]

152. "The Motel Life"- Willy Vlautin

http://www.willyvlautin.com/home.html

[NNadir]

154. "The Grapes of Wrath" by John Steinbeck.