What Books are you Reading ?

[Speedhump]

Just now, rott said:

The Reformation: A History

Diarmaid MacCulloch

 

A bit of interesting if unintentional myth busting. 

 

The word Protestant originated from the 2nd Diet of Speyer 1529, when the Lutheran Princes issued a Protestatio (Latin for Statement or Declaration) of their common principles. They became known as Protestants (the People of the Declaration). 

 

So not the accepted "truth" that "it was because Luther made a protest". 

That's a good book, I also read it. 

[champers]

In his memoirs of serving with the Border Regiment in Burma during WW2, George MacDonald Fraser reccommended a couple of books:

1. The Cat's Revenge by Claude Balls.

2. The Nail in the Bannister by R. Stornaway.

GMF's memoirs, titled Quartered Safe Out Here, is mostly a serious account of fighting the Japanese in Burma. Particularly harrowing is his account of the first time he killed an enemy.

GMF is best known for his Flashman novels but this memoir is a tremendous read.

[soumanioco]

Stoner by John Williams

[1FinickyOne]

On 5/26/2021 at 5:03 PM, BKKBike09 said:

'Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City' by Matthew Desmond.

just went to check it out on Amazon and read reviews.. I see it is very widely acclaimed and yet the first review I read was from a fellow who had some rentals in the same area... and he reported the risks and frustrations of being a landlord there... one tenant gave away a front screen door to a friend - another needed new kitchen cabinets claiming they had been stolen??

 

He gave the book a low rating... and having had a rental house in USA my last few years there, I can surely sympathize with the landlord though I am sure there are some awful landlords out there too.. 

[Jonnapat]

Knife.   Jo Nesbo.

 

Best crime fiction writer in my opinion 

[CALSinCM]

Currently
Lonesome Dove: Larry McMurtry

In the cue
Freedom: Sebastian Junger

Pick it back up (half finished)
Altered Carbon


 

[Pedrogaz]

Re-reading 'The Bone Clocks' by David Mitchell.

[canthai55]

4 hours ago, Speedhump said:

Now reading The Great Empires of Asia, but it's disappointing, seven potted histories with little meat. 

Years ago, when my wife and I were splitting up, I went down river in Dawson, YT for freeze-up to help a friend build a scribed log house.

Started on The Story of Civilization. 11 volumes, but got thru it that winter.

Short days and long nites made for a lot of time to read.

 

[LarryLEB]

I just finished A Separate Peace by John Knowles and am now about halfway through Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe (by Fanny Flagg).  I read 4 or 5 books a month.

 

Trivia note:  You may remember Fanny Flagg as a frequent guest star on Match Game with Gene Rayburn.

 

As others have noted, the Kindle is the way to go for readers in Thailand.  Posters here have mentioned some of the advantages of the Kindle, but one advantage hasn't been mentioned...  You can have a sample of the book (often up to the first 10% of the book, not just a random selection) sent to your Kindle.  After reading the sample for free, you can either order the book or delete the sample.

 

I currently have about 60 book samples lined up on my KIndle.

[khunPer]

Just finished "The Alchemist" by Paulo Goelho...????????

[Odysseus123]

I have just got stuck into Haruki Murakami's novel '1Q84' after putting it aside for a few months..

There is no doubt that he is a dazzling novelist as evidenced by 'Kafka on the Shore' and 'The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle'.

[Petethefeet]

On 5/26/2021 at 11:14 AM, Odysseus123 said:

'Bring up the Bodies' by Hilary Mantel.

 

Recently finished 'Slaves in the Family' by Edward Ball-an amazing read.

I have just started The mirror and the light, the final book of the trilogy. 875 pages. She is an amazing writer. I have never read any historical fiction until I read the first book, Wolf hall. I was hooked.

[Al BB]

Just Finished reading "The Traitor and The Spy" - Ben Macintyre.

I like to read true accounts of espionage during WW2 and "", Cold War in particular.

Reading some of the posts, I MUST get a Kindle ???? 

[pgrahmm]

Now that you've fanned the flames - how about some Kindle recommendations?

Clearly we have a gathering of readers....

[BKKBike09]

4 hours ago, 1FinickyOne said:

just went to check it out on Amazon and read reviews.. I see it is very widely acclaimed and yet the first review I read was from a fellow who had some rentals in the same area... and he reported the risks and frustrations of being a landlord there... one tenant gave away a front screen door to a friend - another needed new kitchen cabinets claiming they had been stolen??

 

He gave the book a low rating... and having had a rental house in USA my last few years there, I can surely sympathize with the landlord though I am sure there are some awful landlords out there too.. 

You should read it and make up your own mind. Seemed to me basically landlords trying to make as much money as they could while spending as little as possible on maintenance. And I don't mean maintenance issues like a dripping tap. No hot water in Milwaukee in January for a month? Blocked toilet? Stop complaining or get evicted. Get assaulted by a violent partner and call the police? Get evicted. Have young children and fall behind on rent? Get evicted.

 

This is the story of how it's possible to make good money from the poorest tenants, people who are allocating almost all of their limited financial resources to housing (80-90%, not 30-40%). Often they can't afford to take the time to fight an eviction order, or even just the threat of one. How some of the tenants whose stories are laid out in this book were able to deal with life beats me.

[1FinickyOne]

3 minutes ago, BKKBike09 said:

You should read it and make up your own mind. Seemed to me basically landlords trying to make as much money as they could while spending as little as possible on maintenance. And I don't mean maintenance issues like a dripping tap. No hot water in Milwaukee in January for a month? Blocked toilet? Stop complaining or get evicted. Get assaulted by a violent partner and call the police? Get evicted. Have young children and fall behind on rent? Get evicted.

 

This is the story of how it's possible to make good money from the poorest tenants, people who are allocating almost all of their limited financial resources to housing (80-90%, not 30-40%). Often they can't afford to take the time to fight an eviction order, or even just the threat of one. How some of the tenants whose stories are laid out in this book were able to deal with life beats me.

yes, i assumed that was what the book was about, but as an ex-Ny'er, that is sort of old news. Unscrupulous landlords getting rid of rent controlled tenants, often elderly w/no place to go.. and using the most brutal of means... and sometimes, as the Kushner family does now, seemingly have found new ways to be beyond cruel... 

 

I saw one black lady being interviewed. They let her out of her lease, seemingly happy to get her out.. then years later, betting on the fact that she had not kept the paperwork, they tried to collect back rent for after she had left... saying she had signed a lease... I believe they were doing this in a housing project in Baltimore... 

 

I am happy for his work and acclaim - but again, isn't this an old story that has been going on for a long time?

[1FinickyOne]

4 hours ago, CALSinCM said:

Currently
Lonesome Dove: Larry McMurtry

Wish I could read that again for a first time... and the movie version was wonderful!!! 

[Disparate Dan]

7 hours ago, Speedhump said:

Buy a secondhand Kindle (or even new). It will change your experience. Use the caliber app on PC or Mac to upload/download books and manage your whole ebook library. I read in the pool and in the dark quite a bit, so paper books are now just for decoration or research.

Not disagreeing, but you don't need a Kindle or other special device. I have a 5-year old android tablet with two different e-reader programs, and can remove DRM on my pooter, so I am totally independent of Amazon etc.

I still prefer hard copy books, with real pages, but given the difficulty of getting them here, I'll settle for e-reading. Currently: Napoleon (by Paul Johnson) and re-reading Any Human Heart by the excellent William Boyd.

[Mansell]

I have a long list, mainly because I download ebooks from a library in the USA. You could do this if you have a friend there let you use their library card. Never late returning books and no fines, and pretty easy to renew the book if you are a slow reader.

 

All of the books below are non-fiction, as that is all I read.

 

just started: The Big Miss by Hank Haney. My years coaching Tiger Woods.

 

Wild Thing.....life of Jimi Hendrix

 

Chasing the Light by Oliver Stone. The writer director of many movies .

 

Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan written by a reporter who worked closely with them.

 

The Heir Apparent: the life of Edward VII and his relationship with his mother Victoria.....and she was a pretty nasty piece of work.....my comment. Good book.

 

The Splendid and the Vile. WWII and Churchill and Hitler. Good read.

 

17 Carnations. Basically the story of the Duke of Windsor and the Royals around WWII.

 

American Moonshot. John Kennedy, the Space Race, Congress, and Lyndon Johnson. Johnson seemed to grasp very early on about the importance of this endeavor.

 

Madame Fourcade’s Secret War. A young woman in France in WWII who led one of the largest underground networks. Amazing women who worked closely with MI5 or 6 at a time when women were considered inferior.

An absolutely superb book....the best one here. This young woman did the impossible in an extremely dangerous time when you didn’t know who to trust. She was rebuffed by De Gaulle because she wouldn’t work with him and only British Intelligence. The part that deals with D Day is amazing with what was accomplished before the landings.....I have never read anywhere what a French schoolteacher and his son did mapping the complete Normandy defenses. Great read.

 

Sailing Around the World Alone by Joshua Slocum. This is in the 1800’s, the first man to do this alone. Sounds like it would be boring, but it is anything but....really good writer.

 

The Loss of the Titanic by one of the survivors......a different perspective.

 

The Spy and the Traitor. Cold War dealing with double agents.

 

War and Peace and War. The Rise and Fall of Empires.

 

Sex on the Moon. Story of a heist of Moon Rocks.

 

Room 1219. The life story of Fatty Arbuckle......basically the rise and fall. The guy got a raw deal from the press of the time which plain lied about him and the Coke bottle and the young woman dying.

 

Gold Dust Woman. Story of Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac.

 

Hitler’s Furies. German women in the killing fields of WWII many by choice.

 

Five Presidents by Clint Hill. This man was the Secret Service Agent who climbed onto the Limo when Kennedy was shot. An insight into the presidents he worked with.....some surprises in who were decent people, to who were not so great.

 

The Skies Belong To Us. Love and Terror in the golden age of hijackings.

 

As you can tell I love reading....this is the short list.

[canthai55]

Shortly to read again - gotta be 5 times at least ...

Hanta Yo - Ruth Beebe Hill

[Logosone]

Just read "Cary Grant, a brilliant disguise".

 

Did you know 4 women left the most attractive and richest actor of his generation?

 

Will now read The Alchemy of Finance by George Soros.

[phetphet]

Whispering Wind: Adventures in Arnhem Land by Syd Kyle-Little.

 

Thanks to someone on Thaivisa who sent me a link to download it.

[covidiot]

13 minutes ago, Logosone said:

Will now read The Alchemy of Finance by George Soros.

is that classified as fiction or non-fiction?

 

[Logosone]

12 minutes ago, covidiot said:

is that classified as fiction or non-fiction?

 

 

Well it was written back in 1987, and this book is supposedly an excellent introduction to the previous century’s financial trends. In addition to his analyses, Soros sets up new paradigms that make it easier to understand financial systems.

 

Soros is perhaps the greatest forex trader of all time, so I am hoping to further my forex trading knowledge. But I also think it will be a good idea to retrospectively check the validity of Soros ideas with the benefit of knowing what transpired since 1987. After all just because a man makes 2 billion USD in on one day that does not mean his ideas are necessarily all correct. But it will be interesting to see what he got right, what he got wrong. That's my hope anyway. If it's anything like reading Karl Popper, his idol, ie like watching paint dry, I may have to bin it.

Edited May 28, 2021 by Logosone

[BKKBike09]

2 hours ago, 1FinickyOne said:

yes, i assumed that was what the book was about, but as an ex-Ny'er, that is sort of old news. Unscrupulous landlords getting rid of rent controlled tenants, often elderly w/no place to go.. and using the most brutal of means... and sometimes, as the Kushner family does now, seemingly have found new ways to be beyond cruel... 

 

I saw one black lady being interviewed. They let her out of her lease, seemingly happy to get her out.. then years later, betting on the fact that she had not kept the paperwork, they tried to collect back rent for after she had left... saying she had signed a lease... I believe they were doing this in a housing project in Baltimore... 

 

I am happy for his work and acclaim - but again, isn't this an old story that has been going on for a long time?

Sure, unscrupulous landlords getting rid of tenants isn't a new story. But this isn't about rent controlled tenants - this is about the private market, which seems subjects to way fewer controls. The fundamental issue is lack of public housing, forcing people into the private market. The difference in rent between dire, unsanitary and unsafe housing and decent properties often isn't very much: say USD 600 for the former and USD 900 for the latter. But for someone with monthly finances of USD 800, there's no choice.

 

It's also about the effects that the relative high cost of this housing has on poor families in terms of lost opportunity: curtailed access to more choices for education, employment, healthcare. It's sobering and thought provoking. 

 

Also, just because a story is perceived to be an old one, that's surely no reason to ignore it? I thought I had a pretty good understanding of the main issues associated with urban poverty in the West. How wrong I was.

 

 

 

 

[Speedhump]

2 hours ago, Disparate Dan said:

Not disagreeing, but you don't need a Kindle or other special device. I have a 5-year old android tablet with two different e-reader programs, and can remove DRM on my pooter, so I am totally independent of Amazon etc.

I still prefer hard copy books, with real pages, but given the difficulty of getting them here, I'll settle for e-reading. Currently: Napoleon (by Paul Johnson) and re-reading Any Human Heart by the excellent William Boyd.

True, I just find Kindle exceptionally handy, with a fantastic battery life. They are useless for books with detailed maps, foldouts, etc., of course. 

 

And I would never, ever try to read House of Leaves on one. ????????????

[Speedhump]

5 hours ago, canthai55 said:

Years ago, when my wife and I were splitting up, I went down river in Dawson, YT for freeze-up to help a friend build a scribed log house.

Started on The Story of Civilization. 11 volumes, but got thru it that winter.

Short days and long nites made for a lot of time to read.

 

Jesus. And I'm still trying to persuade myself to read Camus. 

[covidiot]

6 minutes ago, Speedhump said:

And I'm still trying to persuade myself to read Camus. 

haven't read camus.

many of the most famous western philosophers are nihilistic and it probably causes more harm than good to read that stuff. 

[covidiot]

4 hours ago, Logosone said:

that make it easier to understand financial systems.

you mean the markets? i believe they're all manipulated. there's nothing to understand. but have a good read! 

 

[Logosone]

3 minutes ago, covidiot said:

you mean the markets? i believe they're all manipulated. there's nothing to understand. but have a good read! 

 

 

Well everyone manipulates the markets to the extent they're able to. But there is a lot to understand about the structures of the market. Obviously Soros understood these structures quite well, or else he would not have made billions on a consistent basis.