alex wrote:

Dylan wrote:Jonathan Franzen (The Corrections, one of the best of the new fiction).

Strong Motion is so much better. Has anyone read "Cool Rules"?

I'll pick that one up. I started his essay collection How To Be Alone yesterday, and I'm really enjoying it so far.

I cut out the part of the quote where you say Franzen can kiss your ass. That didn't seem relevant. Hee hee.

DJ_Statikfire wrote:I'm reading a great biography of Einstein called
Einstein: A Life by Denis ??

It's really amazing. Right now, I'm at about 1929, he's 50yrs old, and the Nazi action in Berlin is really heating up.

Sounds very interesting as does Piccasso/Einstein. Thanks for the recomendations!

Currently, I'm reading Setting Free the Bears by John Irving. It was his first book, and I have to say, it's pretty good. The middle gets a bit long, but it's worth it.

I also just read Cannery Row, which was a fantastic book. I like'd it mostly because I grew up in the country, and during the long winter months in the city, I could turn to that book for a nostalgic feeling.

A guy at work had this..

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/00605 ... ZZZZZZ.jpg

I wanted to smack him over the head w/ it!

Okay, I'll ressurect this one.

I've been reading Backlash by Susan Faludi lately, and it's quite good. Some of the examples are a little dated, but the issues seem to be relevant all the time.

Recently I've been fascinated with the works of Haruki Murakami - so far have read "A Wild Sheep Chase", "Dance, Dance, Dance" and "Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World." He is a writer of superb quality and infinite subtlety.

Also read the latest Umberto Eco epic "Baudolino" - a long slog, but ultimately worth it I guess. Helps to be semi-schooled in the larger scheme of European history. Essentially a tale of a character who wanders back and forth across Europe and Asia in the Middle Ages, surrounded with Gump-like karma. Very tongue in cheek, I'm sure historians around the world are just rolling in the aisles. To me, it was pretty good.

Also read Nabokov's "Pale Fire" for the first time. Input on this, if you like, I know it is some work of "genius" but it's the first thing I've read since "Lolita" and only the second book of his ever. Recommendations for another?

I've just recently cracked the seal on Neal Stephenson's "The Confusion," and will read it heartily (when I can find the time).

Mr. Chimp wrote:Recently I've been fascinated with the works of Haruki Murakami - so far have read "A Wild Sheep Chase", "Dance, Dance, Dance" and "Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World." He is a writer of superb quality and infinite subtlety.

agreed, tho murakami sinks or swims on the strength of his translators, jay rubin is the man in my opinion

I started rereading Salman Rushdie's the Ground Beneath Her Feet, which is about the greatest rock N roll band of all time, VTO. It's great cause it combines his most family-tree detailed aspects with his wit coated in rock history stuff that has been changed to confound.

Really fab.

He says that although Elvis was a white trash American boy who tried to sing like a black man, the Beatles were white trash English boys who tried to sing like American Girls.

word.

Faiz

"Vurt" by Jeff Noon
" The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories" by H.P. Lovecraft
" Perfect Sound Forever-The Story of Pavement" by Rob Jovanovic
" Porno" by Irvine Welsh

Neal Stephenson's The Confusion was great. Just finished it last week. It's the second book in a trilogy though, so you'll have to read Quicksilver (which I didn't care for as much) to understand it. Also, for those of you who haven't checked out Stephenson's Cryptonomicon, I can't give a novel a higher recommendation.

I love all the Vonnegut I've read. As for non-fiction, Godel Escher Bach by Douglas Hofstadter is a favorite of mine...something in there for everyone, and a book that you can flip back and forth in if you so desire.

I'm currently polishing of Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises, and am thinking of re-reading 1984 given the state of the Western world these days...

Moby Dick by Herman Melville
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
both excellent