What book is everyone reading at the moment?

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Origninally posted by jzs
I'm currently reading this. I'm really liking it! What did you think about it?
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I've been a big fan of Richard Dawkins' books since I read Unweaving the Rainbow several years ago and it really boosted my confidence as a skeptic, atheist, and science lover.

I think The Ancestors Tale is absolutely great! Sometimes it's hard to get through but it's completely worth it. I would get so excited about some of the wondrous qualitites of life out there that I would have to stop reading and just think about what I had just read. And I have been reading it for so long that now that it's done I feel kind of at a loss as to what to do with myself. I still haven't read all of The Extended Phenotype so I need to get at that sometime. But I think I will take a break from biology for a moment.

If you get a chance, look at the book reviews on Amazon.com. it's absolutely hilarious. So many people would give it a bad review just because they are creationists. They wouldn't say anything about the writing or anything useful, it's just, "Richard Dawkins is just spewing out more lies. I hate him and evolution has no basis in fact."
 
Foucault's Pendulum, by Umberto Eco.

Various guitar-building books.


--Terry.
 
I recently finished Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs. The blurb said it was supposed to be humorous. Not to me... unless you find humor in human trainwrecks.

Now I am finishing The Twelve Little Cakes by Dominika Dery. Now this book IS funny, and poignant about living in Czechoslovakia in the late 70's and early 80's. There is a very interesting bit when the author as a little girl gets dysentery. The doctor says she could not have gotten it since it doesn't exist:

"It doesn't exist?" my father growled.

"Not under the Socialist Health Care System," the doctor explained. "We cured it years ago. It's one of the diseases our five-year plans have officially wiped out."
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editted for typo
 
I finished reading Swann's Way from Remembrance of Things Past I was going to read the entire first volume but... eh.

Now I'm reading Asimov's Guide to the New Testament.
 
Just finished Michel Shermer’s – The Science of Good and Evil.
Quite a good read, plenty of reference to the facts used in the book. The only criticism I have is in the flow, it is a little off or disjointed i.e. has no ‘build up’.
 
Just finished Johnathan Lethem's new short story collection, Cartoons and Men.

Summerland by Michael Chabon

Rereading A Short History of Everything by Bill Bryson
 
I'm reading Churchill: A Biography , by Roy Jenkins, which I recommend to anyone interested in Churchill or in 20th century British history. So far, I've only reached the period when Churchill was a minister in Asquith's Liberal government (1908-16), which is portrayed in some detail.
 
In the last 2 weeks I've read:

Angels and Demons by Dan Brown (i think). I grade it a B. It's a fictional story about an attempt by science to destroy religion. Not bad really. Sure there is some woo and some unscientific thinking at parts but it flowed well enough.

Big Bang by Simon Singh. I grade it an A-. It's the nonfiction history of cosmology from the measuring of the earth to the WMAP that came out some years ago.

Side note: Did Tycho Brahe REALLY have a brass nose and a pet elk that died but stumbling drunkenly down some stairs? That just sounds too cool to be true.
 
KingMerv00 said:

Side note: Did Tycho Brahe REALLY have a brass nose
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Yes.

Or more exact, he had an artificial nose that was said to be made of an alloy of silver and gold. When his grave was opened, the nose was not there gone but there were traces of copper still left.

and a pet elk that died but stumbling drunkenly down some stairs?
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At least he claimed so in a letter to one of his friends.

I just started to read Magic by misdirection by Dariel Fitzkee.
 
On the fiction side, I just finished The Three Musketeers, and have just started The Sky Road, a science-fiction novel by Ken Macleod. On the non-fiction side, I'm still crunching through a huge pile of guitar-building books.

--Terry.
 
"Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell" by Susanna Clarke.

It has been described as Harry Potter meets Jane Austen but I think it bears more similarity to Charles Dickens.

I've nearly finished it now and have found it to be a very original work. I usually steer clear of any of the blockbuster-style best sellers but this had shelf appeal due to its simple black dust cover.

It is written in an unhurried style, with great attention given to the language. I get the impression that the author really likes the characters she has created and I found myself liking them too. She allows them a lot of freedom within the narrative and has them going off on little side-plots regularly.

It is the first novel from Clarke and I sincerely hope there will be more to come.

A scholarly effort.
 
If I had intellectual pretensions I'd only admit to the collection of Henry James short novels which is my current entry in the "I ought to also read some classic literature from time to time" category. Just finished "Daisy Miller". I don't get why this story is so famous.

If I'm being honest, I'd admit that Mr. James is alternating with a collection of Philip Dick stories, a collection of 3 "Witch World" short novels by Andre Norton, and "The Skrayling Tree" by Michael Moorcock.
 
The Full Facts Book of Cold Reading by Ian Rowland.
 
Upon my mother's insistance I've begun "Mirror Mirror" by Greg Maguire. It's not bad- he's no Neil Gaiman but he's got a good voice and can tell a story.

Not like the one I just finished, an obscure robot novel called "Virtual Girl" that could have benefited from some editing and a consistant POV.
 
'River of Song' by Elijah Wald and John Junkerman.
Book from the documentary of the same name, shows many of the pockets of various music in America today.
 
Martin Gardner's "Are Universes Thicker Than Blackberries?"

Next up, a bio of DeForrest Kelley.
 
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