llllllllllllllllllll wrote: Sun Sep 29, 2024 12:35 pm

enframed wrote: Fri Sep 27, 2024 8:58 am

llllllllllllllllllll wrote: Thu Sep 26, 2024 9:11 pm Rich Dad Poor Dad.

I have to give a report over it for a class and I’m fuckin miserable about it. It was that or Malcolm Gladwell

The fuck is the class? The fuck is wrong with education? That or Gladwell? Fuck.

Business.

Not sure if it’s the teacher or the (other) text book, but a strong inference saying that a govt spending any money in the private sector is just like socialism keeps popping up, which is hilarious. I wish.

I wish that the analogy of government spending to non-profit entity spending was the comparison, cuz that's exactly what it is. No one ever says that though.

I decided to give Elena Ferrante a go. I’m about halfway into My Brilliant Friend, and it’s….ok. I’ve seen it on lists of best books of the century, and I find it a little dubious. I guess I went into it with higher expectations. I also went into it having just read Faulkner’s Light In August.

I’m really into reading on my phone. Being able to alter background and font has allowed me to increase my reading load. I especially like being able to read in the middle of the night without disturbing my bedmate. I use the Hoopla library app, which allows for 5 or so e-books a month.

"Lights Out, Surviving the 70's with UFO" by Martin Popoff. Great read!

As much Elizabeth Hardwick as my psyche can afford.

Dave N. wrote: Mon Sep 30, 2024 9:49 am I decided to give Elena Ferrante a go. I’m about halfway into My Brilliant Friend, and it’s….ok. I’ve seen it on lists of best books of the century, and I find it a little dubious. I guess I went into it with higher expectations. I also went into it having just read Faulkner’s Light In August.

I’m really into reading on my phone. Being able to alter background and font has allowed me to increase my reading load. I especially like being able to read in the middle of the night without disturbing my bedmate. I use the Hoopla library app, which allows for 5 or so e-books a month.

That’s probably the weakest book of the series. I remember liking it but absolutely devouring the next three books.

kokorodoko wrote: Fri Jul 12, 2024 5:36 am Darkness at Noon - REALLY good.

Goes a long way in describing the mental world of Stalinism, a logical labyrinth with all exits sealed off, and the deeply sensed futility of someone within this world trying to mount a defense or speak for themselves on premises which places the accuser always one step ahead. The interior social dynamics of the party are very believably portrayed.

Unfortunate and unimaginative that the character gallery is a simple tracing of real-life Bolshevik celebrities. Even in how their looks are described you know it's the same people.


Just finished:
Depeche Mode : Serhiy Zhadan
A group of teenage boys roaming recently independent Ukraine, traveling back and forth on trains, staying at random people's houses, drinking constantly, trying and mostly failing at petty crime. Very funny, recommend.

Just started:
The Gravel Pit (?) : Vasil Bykau
Wikipedia doesn't list an English title so I'm guessing. Famous Belarusian writer. A former soldier working at a gravel pit goes through his memories of the war, and is trying to uncover something in his own past, the nature of which is unclear. I'm into it.

Second-Hand Time : Svetlana Alexievich
Last book in a series of collected interviews with former inhabitants of the Soviet Union, this one it would seem is especially themed around the end of the Union, how those people reflect on the before/after, and on the kind of human ideal put forward during its reign. 700 pages is intimidating, but I'm consumed with interest and I find it a joy to read.

Dave N. wrote: Mon Sep 30, 2024 9:49 am I decided to give Elena Ferrante a go. I’m about halfway into My Brilliant Friend, and it’s….ok. I’ve seen it on lists of best books of the century, and I find it a little dubious. I guess I went into it with higher expectations. I also went into it having just read Faulkner’s Light In August.

I think her books of this cycle are great. I think she has a way of writing that I have not encountered before. Of course that could be the translation, or both. What is the "it" exactly that you find dubious? The book, or that she is so widely praised? Could definitely see the high expectations after all that has been said and written, though.

Wood Goblin wrote: Tue Oct 08, 2024 3:37 pm

Dave N. wrote: Mon Sep 30, 2024 9:49 am I decided to give Elena Ferrante a go. I’m about halfway into My Brilliant Friend, and it’s….ok. I’ve seen it on lists of best books of the century, and I find it a little dubious. I guess I went into it with higher expectations. I also went into it having just read Faulkner’s Light In August.

I’m really into reading on my phone. Being able to alter background and font has allowed me to increase my reading load. I especially like being able to read in the middle of the night without disturbing my bedmate. I use the Hoopla library app, which allows for 5 or so e-books a month.

That’s probably the weakest book of the series. I remember liking it but absolutely devouring the next three books.

Same. The first piqued my interest enough to continue on but I remember enjoying the rest of the series more than the first. I still need to check out the TV series.

I have mixed (but generally positive) feelings about Kathleen Hanna . . . and, come to think of, mixed (but generally positive) feelings about Rebel Girl, which I’m reading now.

Still chugging on the Caro book. I take long breaks from it, but I am thoroughly enjoying myself. Johnson is in his late 20s and just became a congressman. But he's only whipped out his hog in college. I came here for the hog stories.

Outside of that, I read a book called The Haar, a nice breezy horror read. I won't spoil it, but think it's worth the afternoon it took me to read.

I started a book called Cunning Folk, about some young couple and their kid moving into a house in the country where a person died by suicide. The neighbors are doing spooky things. Utterly boring, I only got about 50 pages in.

Now I'm reading Monster Overhaul by Skerples so I can better run BECMI DND