Rupert's bookshelf: all en-US Wed, 07 Aug 2024 18:40:41 -0700 60 Rupert's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[The Metamorphosis and Other Stories]]> 7723 The Metamorphosis,” a story that is both harrowing and amusing, and a landmark of modern literature.

Bringing together some of Kafka’s finest work, this collection demonstrates the richness and variety of the author’s artistry. “The Judgment,” which Kafka considered to be his decisive breakthrough, and “The Stoker,” which became the first chapter of his novel Amerika, are here included. These two, along with “The Metamorphosis,” form a suite of stories Kafka referred to as “The Sons,” and they collectively present a devastating portrait of the modern family.

Also included are “In the Penal Colony,” a story of a torture machine and its operators and victims, and “A Hunger Artist,” about the absurdity of an artist trying to communicate with a misunderstanding public. Kafka’s lucid, succinct writing chronicles the labyrinthine complexities, the futility-laden horror, and the stifling oppressiveness that permeate his vision of modern life.]]> 224 Franz Kafka 1593080298 Rupert 4 4.08 1915 The Metamorphosis and Other Stories
author: Franz Kafka
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1915
rating: 4
read at: 2014/02/24
date added: 2024/08/07
shelves:
review:

]]> The Sleeper Awakes 10387451 The Sleeper Awakes is H. G. Wells's wildly imaginative story of London in the twenty-second century and the man who by accident becomes owner and master of the world. In 1897 a Victorian gentleman falls into a sleep from which he cannot be waked. During his two centuries of slumber he becomes the Sleeper, the most well known and powerful person in the world. All property is bequeathed to the Sleeper to be administered by a Council on his behalf. The common people, increasingly oppressed, view the Sleeper as a mythical liberator whose awakening will free them from misery. The Sleeper awakes in 2100 to a futuristic London adorned with wondrous technological trappings yet staggering under social injustice and escalating unrest. His awakening sends shock waves throughout London, from the highest meetings of the Council to the workers laboring in factories in the bowels of the city. Daring rescues and villainous treachery abound as workers and capitalists fight desperately for control of the Sleeper.]]> 250 H.G. Wells Rupert 3 3.19 1899 The Sleeper Awakes
author: H.G. Wells
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.19
book published: 1899
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2022/12/23
shelves:
review:

]]> The Outsider 16094417 'The sky seemed to rip apart from end to end to pour fire down upon me'

Meursault will not conform. When his mother dies, he refuses to show his emotions simply to satisfy the expectations of others. And when he commits a random act of violence on a sun-drenched beach, his lack of remorse only compounds his guilt in the eyes of society and law.

Albert Camus' portrayal of a man confronting the absurdity of human life became an existentialist classic. Yet it is also a book filled with quiet joy in the "tender indifference" of the physical world, and Sandra Smith's new translation based on listening to a recording of Camus reading aloud, sensitively renders the subtleties and dreamlike atmosphere of The Outsider.]]> 120 Albert Camus Rupert 5 4.14 1942 The Outsider
author: Albert Camus
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1942
rating: 5
read at: 2012/12/16
date added: 2022/10/17
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity]]> 56269264
For generations, our remote ancestors have been cast as primitive and childlike—either free and equal innocents, or thuggish and warlike. Civilization, we are told, could be achieved only by sacrificing those original freedoms or, alternatively, by taming our baser instincts. David Graeber and David Wengrow show how such theories first emerged in the eighteenth century as a conservative reaction to powerful critiques of European society posed by Indigenous observers and intellectuals. Revisiting this encounter has startling implications for how we make sense of human history today, including the origins of farming, property, cities, democracy, slavery, and civilization itself.

Drawing on pathbreaking research in archaeology and anthropology, the authors show how history becomes a far more interesting place once we learn to throw off our conceptual shackles and perceive what’s really there. If humans did not spend 95 percent of their evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers, what were they doing all that time? If agriculture, and cities, did not mean a plunge into hierarchy and domination, then what kinds of social and economic organization did they lead to? The answers are often unexpected, and suggest that the course of human history may be less set in stone, and more full of playful, hopeful possibilities, than we tend to assume.

The Dawn of Everything fundamentally transforms our understanding of the human past and offers a path toward imagining new forms of freedom, new ways of organizing society. This is a monumental book of formidable intellectual range, animated by curiosity, moral vision, and a faith in the power of direct action.]]> 692 David Graeber 0374157359 Rupert 0 to-read 4.20 2021 The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity
author: David Graeber
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/01
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[How to Stay Alive in the Woods: A Complete Guide to Food, Shelter and Self-Preservation Anywhere]]> 188119 A practical, readable and indispensable guide for anyone venturing into the wilderness, this is a book that should be in every survival kit. Broken down into four essential sections, Sustenance, Warmth, Orientation and Safety, this enlightening manual reveals how to catch game without a gun, what plants to eat (full-color illustrations of these make identification simple), how to build a warm shelter, make clothing, protect yourself and signal for help. Detailed illustrations and expanded instructions offer crucial information at a glance, making How to Stay Alive in the Woods truly a lifesaver.]]> 320 Bradford Angier 1579122213 Rupert 0 to-read 4.02 1956 How to Stay Alive in the Woods: A Complete Guide to Food, Shelter and Self-Preservation Anywhere
author: Bradford Angier
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1956
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/11/01
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Myth of Sisyphus 91950 The Myth of Sisyphus transformed twentieth-century philosophy with its impassioned argument for the value of life in a world without religious meaning.]]> 192 Albert Camus 0141182008 Rupert 5 4.25 1942 The Myth of Sisyphus
author: Albert Camus
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1942
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2021/10/09
shelves:
review:

]]> 1Q84 (1Q84, #1-3) 10357575 The year is 1984 and the city is Tokyo.

A young woman named Aomame follows a taxi driver’s enigmatic suggestion and begins to notice puzzling discrepancies in the world around her. She has entered, she realizes, a parallel existence, which she calls 1Q84 —“Q is for ‘question mark.’ A world that bears a question.” Meanwhile, an aspiring writer named Tengo takes on a suspect ghostwriting project. He becomes so wrapped up with the work and its unusual author that, soon, his previously placid life begins to come unraveled.

As Aomame’s and Tengo’s narratives converge over the course of this single year, we learn of the profound and tangled connections that bind them ever closer: a beautiful, dyslexic teenage girl with a unique vision; a mysterious religious cult that instigated a shoot-out with the metropolitan police; a reclusive, wealthy dowager who runs a shelter for abused women; a hideously ugly private investigator; a mild-mannered yet ruthlessly efficient bodyguard; and a peculiarly insistent television-fee collector.

A love story, a mystery, a fantasy, a novel of self-discovery, a dystopia to rival George Orwell’s — 1Q84 is Haruki Murakami’s most ambitious undertaking yet: an instant best seller in his native Japan, and a tremendous feat of imagination from one of our most revered contemporary writers.]]> 944 Haruki Murakami 0307593312 Rupert 3 3.94 2009 1Q84 (1Q84, #1-3)
author: Haruki Murakami
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2009
rating: 3
read at: 2021/10/09
date added: 2021/10/09
shelves:
review:

]]> Dark Matter 27833670 A mindbending, relentlessly surprising thriller from the author of the bestselling Wayward Pines trilogy.

Jason Dessen is walking home through the chilly Chicago streets one night, looking forward to a quiet evening in front of the fireplace with his wife, Daniela, and their son, Charlie—when his reality shatters.

"Are you happy with your life?"

Those are the last words Jason Dessen hears before the masked abductor knocks him unconscious.

Before he awakens to find himself strapped to a gurney, surrounded by strangers in hazmat suits.

Before a man Jason's never met smiles down at him and says, "Welcome back, my friend."

In this world he's woken up to, Jason's life is not the one he knows. His wife is not his wife. His son was never born. And Jason is not an ordinary college physics professor, but a celebrated genius who has achieved something remarkable. Something impossible.

Is it this world or the other that's the dream?

And even if the home he remembers is real, how can Jason possibly make it back to the family he loves? The answers lie in a journey more wondrous and horrifying than anything he could've imagined—one that will force him to confront the darkest parts of himself even as he battles a terrifying, seemingly unbeatable foe.

Dark Matter is a brilliantly plotted tale that is at once sweeping and intimate, mind-bendingly strange and profoundly human--a relentlessly surprising science-fiction thriller about choices, paths not taken, and how far we'll go to claim the lives we dream of.]]> 342 Blake Crouch 1101904224 Rupert 0 currently-reading 4.13 2016 Dark Matter
author: Blake Crouch
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2021/10/09
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> The Chain 42779092
"You are not the first. And you will certainly not be the last." Rachel is now part of The Chain, an unending and ingenious scheme that turns victims into criminals—and is making someone else very rich in the process. The rules are simple, the moral challenges impossible; find the money fast, find your victim, and then commit a horrible act you'd have thought yourself incapable of just twenty-four hours ago.

But what the masterminds behind The Chain know is that parents will do anything for their children. It turns out that kidnapping is only the beginning.]]> 357 Adrian McKinty 031653126X Rupert 4 3.77 2019 The Chain
author: Adrian McKinty
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2021/10/09
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Utopia for Realists: How We Can Build the Ideal World]]> 40876575 Universal basic income. A 15-hour workweek. Open borders. Does it sound too good to be true? One of Europe's leading young thinkers shows how we can build an ideal world today.

After working all day at jobs we often dislike, we buy things we don't need. Rutger Bregman, a Dutch historian, reminds us it needn't be this way—and in some places it isn't. Rutger Bregman's TED Talk about universal basic income seemed impossibly radical when he delivered it in 2014. A quarter of a million views later, the subject of that video is being seriously considered by leading economists and government leaders the world over. It's just one of the many utopian ideas that Bregman proves is possible today.

Utopia for Realists is one of those rare books that takes you by surprise and challenges what you think can happen. From a Canadian city that once completely eradicated poverty, to Richard Nixon's near implementation of a basic income for millions of Americans, Bregman takes us on a journey through history, and beyond the traditional left-right divides, as he champions ideas whose time have come.

Every progressive milestone of civilization—from the end of slavery to the beginning of democracy—was once considered a utopian fantasy. Bregman's book, both challenging and bracing, demonstrates that new utopian ideas, like the elimination of poverty and the creation of the fifteen-hour workweek, can become a reality in our lifetime. Being unrealistic and unreasonable can in fact make the impossible inevitable, and it is the only way to build the ideal world.]]> 262 Rutger Bregman 0316471909 Rupert 4 4.24 2014 Utopia for Realists: How We Can Build the Ideal World
author: Rutger Bregman
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2020/07/24
date added: 2020/07/24
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Useful Work versus Useless Toil]]> 5982828 94 William Morris 0141036702 Rupert 0 to-read 3.76 1884 Useful Work versus Useless Toil
author: William Morris
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.76
book published: 1884
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/07/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives]]> 4948826 Sum is a dazzling exploration of unexpected afterlives—each presented as a vignette that offers a stunning lens through which to see ourselves in the here and now. In one afterlife, you may find that God is the size of a microbe and unaware of your existence. In another version, you work as a background character in other people’s dreams. Or you may find that God is a married couple, or that the universe is running backward, or that you are forced to live out your afterlife with annoying versions of who you could have been. With a probing imagination and deep understanding of the human condition, acclaimed neuroscientist David Eagleman offers wonderfully imagined tales that shine a brilliant light on the here and now.]]> 110 David Eagleman 0307377342 Rupert 4 4.13 2009 Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives
author: David Eagleman
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2020/07/18
shelves:
review:

]]> MaddAddam (MaddAddam, #3) 17262203
Told with wit, dizzying imagination, and dark humour, Booker Prize-winning Margaret Atwood’s unpredictable, chilling and hilarious MaddAddam takes us further into a challenging dystopian world and holds up a skewed mirror to our own possible future.]]> 394 Margaret Atwood 0385528787 Rupert 5 4.00 2013 MaddAddam (MaddAddam, #3)
author: Margaret Atwood
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2013
rating: 5
read at: 2019/01/19
date added: 2020/07/18
shelves:
review:

]]> Being and Nothingness 10033 Being & Nothingness is without doubt one of the most significant philosophical books of the 20th century. The central work by one of the century's most influential thinkers, it altered the course of western philosophy. Its revolutionary approach challenged all previous assumptions about the individual's relationship with the world. Known as 'the Bible of existentialism', its impact on culture & literature was immediate & was felt worldwide, from the absurdist drama of Samuel Beckett to the soul-searching cries of the Beat poets.
Being & Nothingness is one of those rare books whose influence has affected the mindset of subsequent generations. Seventy years after its 1st publication, its message remains as potent as ever--challenging readers to confront the fundamental dilemmas of human freedom, choice, responsibility & action.]]> 688 Jean-Paul Sartre 0415278481 Rupert 0 to-read 4.00 1943 Being and Nothingness
author: Jean-Paul Sartre
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1943
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2020/07/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays]]> 11987 212 Albert Camus Rupert 5 4.23 1942 The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays
author: Albert Camus
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1942
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2020/07/18
shelves:
review:

]]> The Sea Is My Brother 6297072 The Sea Is My Brother.

Now, nearly seventy years later, its long-awaited publication provides fascinating details and insight into the early life and development of an American literary icon. Written seven years before The Town and The City officially launched his writing career, The Sea Is My Brother marks a pivotal point in which Kerouac began laying the foundations for his pioneering method and signature style. A clear precursor to such landmark works as On the Road, The Dharma Bums, and Visions of Cody, it is an important formative work that bears all the hallmarks of classic Kerouac: the search for spiritual meaning in a materialistic world, spontaneous travel as the true road to freedom, late nights in bars and apartments engaged in intense conversation, the desperate urge to escape from society, and the strange, terrible beauty of loneliness.]]> 256 Jack Kerouac Rupert 4 3.60 2011 The Sea Is My Brother
author: Jack Kerouac
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.60
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2012/01/01
date added: 2020/07/18
shelves:
review:

]]> One Hundred Years of Solitude 320 417 Gabriel García Márquez Rupert 4 4.10 1967 One Hundred Years of Solitude
author: Gabriel García Márquez
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1967
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2019/01/19
shelves:
review:

]]> The Fall 11991
The Fall (French: La Chute) is a philosophical novel by Albert Camus. First published in 1956, it is his last complete work of fiction. The Fall explores themes of innocence, imprisonment, non-existence, and truth. In a eulogy to Albert Camus, existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre described the novel as "perhaps the most beautiful and the least understood" of Camus' books.]]> 147 Albert Camus 0679720227 Rupert 0 4.07 1956 The Fall
author: Albert Camus
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.07
book published: 1956
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2019/01/19
shelves:
review:

]]> Slaughterhouse-Five 108978 This is an alternative cover edition for ISBN 9780099800200

Prisoner of war, optometrist, time-traveller - these are the life roles of Billy Pilgrim, hero of this miraculously moving, bitter and funny story of innocence faced with apocalypse. Slaughterhouse 5 is one of the world's great anti-war books. Centring on the infamous fire-bombing of Dresden in the Second World War, Billy Pilgrim's odyssey through time reflects the journey of our own fractured lives as we search for meaning in what we are afraid to know.]]> 157 Kurt Vonnegut Jr. Rupert 5 4.01 1969 Slaughterhouse-Five
author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1969
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2018/12/02
shelves:
review:

]]> Fighting in Spain 1072933 154 George Orwell 0141025530 Rupert 4 3.83 Fighting in Spain
author: George Orwell
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.83
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2012/11/19
date added: 2015/04/23
shelves:
review:

]]> Fahrenheit 451 4381 158 Ray Bradbury 0307347974 Rupert 4 3.96 1953 Fahrenheit 451
author: Ray Bradbury
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1953
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2014/11/21
shelves:
review:

]]> Fahrenheit 451 17470674
Guy Montag is a fireman. His job is to burn books, which are forbidden, being the source of all discord and unhappiness. Even so, Montag is unhappy; there is discord in his marriage. Are books hidden in his house? The Mechanical Hound of the Fire Department, armed with a lethal hypodermic, escorted by helicopters, is ready to track down those dissidents who defy society to preserve and read books.

The classic dystopian novel of a post-literate future, Fahrenheit 451 stands alongside Orwell’s 1984 and Huxley’s Brave New World as a prophetic account of Western civilization’s enslavement by the media, drugs and conformity.

Bradbury’s powerful and poetic prose combines with uncanny insight into the potential of technology to create a novel which, decades on from first publication, still has the power to dazzle and shock.

--back cover]]> 227 Ray Bradbury 0007491565 Rupert 4 4.01 1953 Fahrenheit 451
author: Ray Bradbury
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1953
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2014/11/21
shelves:
review:

]]> Saturday 5015
Later, as Perowne makes his way through London streets filled with hundreds of thousands of anti-war protestors, a minor car accident brings him into a confrontation with Baxter, a fidgety, aggressive young man, on the edge of violence. To Perowne's professional eye, there appears to be something profoundly wrong with him. But it is not until Baxter makes a sudden appearance as the Perowne family gathers for a reunion, that Henry's fears seem about to be realised.]]> 289 Ian McEwan 1400076196 Rupert 3 3.64 2005 Saturday
author: Ian McEwan
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2005
rating: 3
read at: 2012/06/13
date added: 2014/10/18
shelves:
review:

]]> Bob Marley: My Son 370956 272 Cedella Marley Booker 0878332987 Rupert 5 4.15 1997 Bob Marley: My Son
author: Cedella Marley Booker
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1997
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2014/10/18
shelves:
review:

]]> Timequake 9594
With his trademark wicked wit, Vonnegut addresses memory, suicide, the Great Depression, the loss of American eloquence, and the obsolescent thrill of reading books.]]> 219 Kurt Vonnegut Jr. 0099267543 Rupert 2 3.72 1997 Timequake
author: Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.72
book published: 1997
rating: 2
read at: 2013/01/22
date added: 2014/10/18
shelves:
review:

]]> Big Sur 50140
"Big Sur's humane, precise account of the extraordinary ravages of alcohol delirium tremens on Kerouac, a superior novelist who had strength to complete his poetic narrative, a task few scribes so afflicted have accomplished—others crack up. Here we meet San Francisco's poets & recognize hero Dean Moriarty ten years after On the Road. Jack Kerouac was a 'writer,' as his great peer W.S. Burroughs says, and here at the peak of his suffering humorous genius he wrote through his misery to end with 'Sea,' a brilliant poem appended, on the hallucinatory Sounds of the Pacific Ocean at Big Sur."—Allen Ginsberg 10/10/91 N.Y.C.]]> 256 Jack Kerouac 0140168125 Rupert 3 3.85 1962 Big Sur
author: Jack Kerouac
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.85
book published: 1962
rating: 3
read at: 2013/05/12
date added: 2014/10/18
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[News from Nowhere and Other Writings]]> 189745 430 William Morris Rupert 4 3.46 1890 News from Nowhere and Other Writings
author: William Morris
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.46
book published: 1890
rating: 4
read at: 2013/07/08
date added: 2014/10/18
shelves:
review:

]]> Walden or, Life in the Woods 16902 352 Henry David Thoreau Rupert 4 3.77 1854 Walden or, Life in the Woods
author: Henry David Thoreau
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1854
rating: 4
read at: 2014/02/14
date added: 2014/10/18
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Year of the Flood (MaddAddam, #2)]]> 6080337
Have others survived? Ren's bioartist friend Amanda? Zeb, her eco-fighter stepfather? Her onetime lover, Jimmy? Or the murderous Painballers, survivors of the mutual-elimination Painball prison? Not to mention the shadowy, corrupt policing force of the ruling powers...

Meanwhile, gene-spliced life forms are proliferating: the lion/lamb blends, the Mo'hair sheep with human hair, the pigs with human brain tissue. As Adam One and his intrepid hemp-clad band make their way through this strange new world, Ren and Toby will have to decide on their next move. They can't stay locked away...

By turns dark, tender, violent, thoughtful, and uneasily hilarious, The Year of the Flood is Atwood at her most brilliant and inventive.]]> 431 Margaret Atwood 0385528779 Rupert 5 4.06 2009 The Year of the Flood (MaddAddam, #2)
author: Margaret Atwood
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2009
rating: 5
read at: 2014/10/18
date added: 2014/10/18
shelves:
review:

]]> Dune (Dune, #1) 234225 Dune is the story of the boy Paul Atreides, heir to a noble family tasked with ruling an inhospitable world where the only thing of value is the "spice" melange, a drug capable of extending life and enhancing consciousness. Coveted across the known universe, melange is a prize worth killing for...

When House Atreides is betrayed, the destruction of Paul's family will set the boy on a journey toward a destiny greater than he could ever have imagined. And as he evolves into the mysterious man known as Muad'Dib, he will bring to fruition humankind's most ancient and unattainable dream.

A stunning blend of adventure and mysticism, environmentalism and politics, Dune won the first Nebula Award, shared the Hugo Award, and formed the basis of what is undoubtedly the grandest epic in science fiction.]]> 604 Frank Herbert 0340839937 Rupert 5 4.21 1965 Dune (Dune, #1)
author: Frank Herbert
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1965
rating: 5
read at: 2014/10/09
date added: 2014/10/09
shelves:
review:

]]> Far North 4889214 Far North is a 2009 National Book Award Finalist for Fiction.

My father had an expression for a thing that turned out bad. He'd say it had gone west. But going west always sounded pretty good to me. After all, westwards is the path of the sun. And through as much history as I know of, people have moved west to settle and find freedom. But our world had gone north, truly gone north, and just how far north I was beginning to learn.

Out on the frontier of a failed state, Makepeace—sheriff and perhaps last citizen—patrols a city's ruins, salvaging books but keeping the guns in good repair.

Into this cold land comes shocking evidence that life might be flourishing elsewhere: a refugee emerges from the vast emptiness of forest, whose existence inspires Makepeace to reconnect with human society and take to the road, armed with rough humor and an unlikely ration of optimism.

What Makepeace finds is a world unraveling: stockaded villages enforcing an uncertain justice and hidden work camps laboring to harness the little-understood technologies of a vanished civilization. But Makepeace's journey—rife with danger—also leads to an unexpected redemption.

Far North takes the reader on a quest through an unforgettable arctic landscape, from humanity's origins to its possible end. Haunting, spare, yet stubbornly hopeful, the novel is suffused with an ecstatic awareness of the world's fragility and beauty, and its ability to recover from our worst trespasses.]]> 288 Marcel Theroux 0571237770 Rupert 0 to-read 3.79 2009 Far North
author: Marcel Theroux
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2014/09/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Rainbows End 102439
With knowledge comes risk. When Robert begins to re-train at Fairmont High, learning with other older people what is second nature to Miri and other teens at school, he unwittingly becomes part of a wide-ranging conspiracy to use technology as a tool for world domination.

In a world where every computer chip has Homeland Security built-in, this conspiracy is something that baffles even the most sophisticated security analysts, including Robert’s son and daughter-in law, two top people in the U.S. military. And even Miri, in her attempts to protect her grandfather, may be entangled in the plot.

As Robert becomes more deeply involved in conspiracy, he is shocked to learn of a radical change planned for the UCSD Geisel Library; all the books there, and worldwide, would cease to physically exist. He and his fellow re-trainees feel compelled to join protests against the change. With forces around the world converging on San Diego, both the conspiracy and the protest climax in a spectacular moment as unique and satisfying as it is unexpected.]]> 381 Vernor Vinge 0812536363 Rupert 3 3.78 2006 Rainbows End
author: Vernor Vinge
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2006
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2014/09/05
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Final Fantasy and Philosophy: The Ultimate Walkthrough]]> 6687097 240 William Irwin 0470415363 Rupert 5 3.55 2009 Final Fantasy and Philosophy: The Ultimate Walkthrough
author: William Irwin
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.55
book published: 2009
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2014/07/13
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Lost and Philosophy: The Island Has Its Reasons]]> 1757386
A provocative study of the hit television show, Lost, currently in its third season and set to reach its climax in 2010

Highlights the sense in which Lost is a genuinely philosophical show

Helps fans understand and navigate some of Lost's deeper meanings

Connects episodes and events in the show to core philosophical issues such as truth, identity, and morality

Shows that it's no accident that there are Lost characters names Locke, Rousseau, and Hume]]> 262 Sharon M. Kaye 1405163151 Rupert 4 3.65 2007 Lost and Philosophy: The Island Has Its Reasons
author: Sharon M. Kaye
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at: 2014/06/01
date added: 2014/07/13
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (Maya Angelou's Autobiography, #1)]]> 13214
Here is a book as joyous and painful, as mysterious and memorable, as childhood itself. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings captures the longing of lonely children, the brute insult of bigotry, and the wonder of words that can make the world right. Maya Angelou’s debut memoir is a modern American classic beloved worldwide.

Sent by their mother to live with their devout, self-sufficient grandmother in a small Southern town, Maya and her brother, Bailey, endure the ache of abandonment and the prejudice of the local “powhitetrash.” At eight years old and back at her mother’s side in St. Louis, Maya is attacked by a man many times her age—and has to live with the consequences for a lifetime. Years later, in San Francisco, Maya learns that love for herself, the kindness of others, her own strong spirit, and the ideas of great authors (“I met and fell in love with William Shakespeare”) will allow her to be free instead of imprisoned.

Poetic and powerful, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings will touch hearts and change minds for as long as people read.]]> 289 Maya Angelou 0553279378 Rupert 5 4.30 1969 I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (Maya Angelou's Autobiography, #1)
author: Maya Angelou
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.30
book published: 1969
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2014/02/03
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Feminism Is for Everybody: Passionate Politics]]> 168484 123 bell hooks 0896086283 Rupert 5 4.16 2000 Feminism Is for Everybody: Passionate Politics
author: bell hooks
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2000
rating: 5
read at: 2014/01/08
date added: 2014/01/08
shelves:
review:

]]> The Music of Chance 19490 217 Paul Auster 0571203035 Rupert 5 3.97 1990 The Music of Chance
author: Paul Auster
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1990
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/09/12
shelves:
review:

]]> Hotheads 100108 How the Mind Works he takes us deep into the human psyche as he considers people's desire for happiness, the power of the emotions and how love can come to conquer all.]]> 58 Steven Pinker 0141022388 Rupert 0 3.80 2005 Hotheads
author: Steven Pinker
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2005
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2013/07/24
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory]]> 51714 First published in 1990, The Sexual Politics of Meat is a landmark text in the ongoing debates about animal rights. In the two decades since, the book has inspired controversy and heated debate.

Praise for The Sexual Politics of Meat:

CAROL J. ADAMS is the author of The Pornography of Meat (Continuum, 2004), and co-author of Beyond Animal Rights (Continuum, 2000), and The Bedside, Bathtub, and Armchair Companion to Jane Austen (Continuum, 2008). She has toured as a speaker throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe. More information can be found at her website:

]]> 272 Carol J. Adams 0826411843 Rupert 4 3.96 1990 The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory
author: Carol J. Adams
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1990
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/04/20
shelves:
review:

]]> The God of Small Things 9777
Armed only with the invincible innocence of children, they fashion a childhood for themselves in the shade of the wreck that is their family—their lonely, lovely mother, Ammu (who loves by night the man her children love by day), their blind grandmother, Mammachi (who plays Handel on her violin), their beloved uncle Chacko (Rhodes scholar, pickle baron, radical Marxist, bottom-pincher), their enemy, Baby Kochamma (ex-nun and incumbent grandaunt), and the ghost of an imperial entomologist's moth (with unusually dense dorsal tufts).

When their English cousin, Sophie Mol, and her mother, Margaret Kochamma, arrive on a Christmas visit, Esthappen and Rahel learn that Things Can Change in a Day. That lives can twist into new, ugly shapes, even cease forever, beside their river "graygreen." With fish in it. With the sky and trees in it. And at night, the broken yellow moon in it.

The brilliantly plotted story uncoils with an agonizing sense of foreboding and inevitability. Yet nothing prepares you for what lies at the heart of it.

The God of Small Things takes on the Big Themes—Love. Madness. Hope. Infinite Joy. Here is a writer who dares to break the rules. To dislocate received rhythms and create the language she requires, a language that is at once classical and unprecedented. Arundhati Roy has given us a book that is anchored to anguish, but fueled by wit and magic.]]> 321 Arundhati Roy 0679457313 Rupert 0 to-read 3.97 1997 The God of Small Things
author: Arundhati Roy
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1997
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2013/04/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Making A Killing: The Political Economy of Animal Rights]]> 1479997
With a focus on labor, property, and the life of commodities, Making a Killing contains key insights into the broad nature of domination, power, and hierarchy. It explores the intersections between human and animal oppressions in relation to the exploitative dynamics of capitalism.

Combining nuts-and-bolts Marxist political economy, a pluralistic anarchist critique, as well as a searing assessment of the animal rights movement, Bob Torres challenges conventional anti-capitalist thinking and convincingly advocates for the abolition of animals in industry—and on the dinner plate.]]> 185 Bob Torres 1904859674 Rupert 4 4.15 2007 Making A Killing: The Political Economy of Animal Rights
author: Bob Torres
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/03/17
shelves:
review:

]]> Blind Faith 2164457 368 Ben Elton 0552773905 Rupert 3 3.72 2007 Blind Faith
author: Ben Elton
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2007
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> On the Road 70401 307 Jack Kerouac 0140042598 Rupert 5 3.63 1957 On the Road
author: Jack Kerouac
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.63
book published: 1957
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> The Dharma Bums 412732 On the Road put the Beat Generation on the map, The Dharma Bums is sparked by Kerouac's expansiveness, humor, and a contagious zest for life.]]> 244 Jack Kerouac Rupert 5 3.94 1958 The Dharma Bums
author: Jack Kerouac
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.94
book published: 1958
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> The Beach 607639
The Khao San Road, Bangkok -- first stop for the hordes of rootless young Westerners traveling in Southeast Asia. On Richard's first night there, in a low-budget guest house, a fellow traveller slashes his wrists, bequeathing to Richard a meticulously drawn map to "the Beach."

The Beach, as Richard has come to learn, is the subject of a legend among young travellers in Asia: a lagoon hidden from the sea, with white sand and coral gardens, freshwater falls surrounded by jungle, plants untouched for a thousand years. There, it is rumoured, a carefully selected international few have settled in a communal Eden.

Haunted by the figure of Mr. Duck -- the name by which the Thai police have identified the dead man -- and his own obsession with Vietnam movies, Richard sets off with a young French couple to an island hidden away in an archipelago forbidden to tourists. They discover the Beach, and it is as beautiful and idyllic as it is reputed to be. Yet over time it becomes clear that Beach culture, as Richard calls it, has troubling, even deadly, undercurrents.

Spellbinding and hallucinogenic, The Beach by Alex Garland -- both a national bestseller and his debut -- is a highly accomplished and suspenseful novel that fixates on a generation in their twenties, who, burdened with the legacy of the preceding generation and saturated by popular culture, long for an unruined landscape, but find it difficult to experience the world first hand.]]> 436 Alex Garland 1573226521 Rupert 5 3.98 1996 The Beach
author: Alex Garland
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1996
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> Brave New World 5129 Brave New World is a searching vision of an unequal, technologically-advanced future where humans are genetically bred, socially indoctrinated, and pharmaceutically anesthetized to passively uphold an authoritarian ruling order–all at the cost of our freedom, full humanity, and perhaps also our souls. “A genius [who] who spent his life decrying the onward march of the Machine” (The New Yorker), Huxley was a man of incomparable talents: equally an artist, a spiritual seeker, and one of history’s keenest observers of human nature and civilization. Brave New World, his masterpiece, has enthralled and terrified millions of readers, and retains its urgent relevance to this day as both a warning to be heeded as we head into tomorrow and as thought-provoking, satisfying work of literature. Written in the shadow of the rise of fascism during the 1930s, Brave New Worldd likewise speaks to a 21st-century world dominated by mass-entertainment, technology, medicine and pharmaceuticals, the arts of persuasion, and the hidden influence of elites.

"Aldous Huxley is the greatest 20th century writer in English." —Chicago Tribune]]> 268 Aldous Huxley 0060929871 Rupert 4 3.99 1932 Brave New World
author: Aldous Huxley
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1932
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> The Road 6288
A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don’t know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food—and each other.

The Road is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, “each the other’s world entire,” are sustained by love. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.]]> 241 Cormac McCarthy 0307265439 Rupert 5 3.99 2006 The Road
author: Cormac McCarthy
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> Animal Farm 7613
The book tells the story of a group of farm animals who rebel against their human farmer, hoping to create a society where the animals can be equal, free, and happy. Ultimately, however, the rebellion is betrayed, and the farm ends up in a state as bad as it was before, under the dictatorship of a pig named Napoleon.

One night, all the animals at Mr. Jones' Manor Farm assemble in a barn to hear old Major, a pig, describe a dream he had about a world where all animals live free from the tyranny of their human masters. Old Major dies soon after the meeting, but the animals — inspired by his philosophy of Animalism — plot a rebellion against Jones.

Two pigs, Snowball and Napoleon, prove themselves important figures and planners of this dangerous enterprise. When Jones forgets to feed the animals, the revolution occurs, and Jones and his men are chased off the farm. Manor Farm is renamed Animal Farm, and the Seven Commandments of Animalism are painted on the barn wall...]]> 129 George Orwell Rupert 4 3.90 1945 Animal Farm
author: George Orwell
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1945
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> The Picture of Dorian Gray 5297
In this celebrated work Wilde forged a devastating portrait of the effects of evil and debauchery on a young aesthete in late-19th-century England. Combining elements of the Gothic horror novel and decadent French fiction, the book centers on a striking premise: As Dorian Gray sinks into a life of crime and gross sensuality, his body retains perfect youth and vigor while his recently painted portrait grows day by day into a hideous record of evil, which he must keep hidden from the world. For over a century, this mesmerizing tale of horror and suspense has enjoyed wide popularity. It ranks as one of Wilde's most important creations and among the classic achievements of its kind.]]> 272 Oscar Wilde Rupert 4 4.13 1890 The Picture of Dorian Gray
author: Oscar Wilde
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1890
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> The Bastille Falls 1426361 Citizens, his award-winning account of the French Revolution, has continued to be one of Penguin's most popular history titles since it was first published in 1989. This extract takes us into the heart of the revolution's ferment as the angry crowd storms the Bastille prison.]]> 56 Simon Schama 014102240X Rupert 3 3.46 2005 The Bastille Falls
author: Simon Schama
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2005
rating: 3
read at: 2012/05/26
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Unbearable Lightness of Being]]> 9717 The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera tells the story of a young woman in love with a man torn between his love for her and his incorrigible womanizing and one of his mistresses and her humbly faithful lover. This magnificent novel juxtaposes geographically distant places, brilliant and playful reflections, and a variety of styles, to take its place as perhaps the major achievement of one of the world’s truly great writers.]]> 314 Milan Kundera 0571224385 Rupert 4 4.12 1984 The Unbearable Lightness of Being
author: Milan Kundera
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1984
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> The Sense of an Ending 10746542 An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here

By an acclaimed writer at the height of his powers, The Sense of an Ending extends a streak of extraordinary books that began with the best-selling Arthur & George and continued with Nothing to Be Frightened Of and, most recently, Pulse.

This intense novel follows a middle-aged man as he contends with a past he has never much thought about - until his closest childhood friends return with a vengeance, one of them from the grave, another maddeningly present. Tony Webster thought he'd left all this behind as he built a life for himself, and by now his marriage and family and career have fallen into an amicable divorce and retirement. But he is then presented with a mysterious legacy that obliges him to reconsider a variety of things he thought he'd understood all along, and to revise his estimation of his own nature and place in the world.

A novel so compelling that it begs to be read in a single sitting, with stunning psychological and emotional depth and sophistication, The Sense of an Ending is a brilliant new chapter in Julian Barnes's oeuvre.]]> 150 Julian Barnes 0224094157 Rupert 4 3.73 2011 The Sense of an Ending
author: Julian Barnes
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2012/05/17
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #1)]]> 11
Together this dynamic pair begin a journey through space aided by quotes from The Hitchhiker's Guide ("A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have") and a galaxy-full of fellow travelers: Zaphod Beeblebrox--the two-headed, three-armed ex-hippie and totally out-to-lunch president of the galaxy; Trillian, Zaphod's girlfriend (formally Tricia McMillan), whom Arthur tried to pick up at a cocktail party once upon a time zone; Marvin, a paranoid, brilliant, and chronically depressed robot; Veet Voojagig, a former graduate student who is obsessed with the disappearance of all the ballpoint pens he bought over the years.

Where are these pens? Why are we born? Why do we die? Why do we spend so much time between wearing digital watches? For all the answers stick your thumb to the stars. And don't forget to bring a towel!]]> 216 Douglas Adams Rupert 4 4.21 1979 The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #1)
author: Douglas Adams
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.21
book published: 1979
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #2)]]> 8695 alternate edition for ISBN 0345418921/9780345418920

Facing annihilation at the hands of the warlike Vogons is a curious time to have a cosmically displaced Arthur Dent and his curious comrades in arms as they hurtle through space powered by pure improbability - and desperately in search of a place to eat. Among Arthur's motley shipmates are Ford Prefect, a long-time friend and contributor to the The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy; Zaphod Beeblebrox, the three-armed, two-headed ex-president of the galaxy; Tricia McMilan, a fellow Earth refuge who's gone native (her name is Trillian now); and Marvin, who suffers nothing and no one gladly.

Source: douglasadams.com]]> 250 Douglas Adams Rupert 4 4.22 1980 The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #2)
author: Douglas Adams
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1980
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Life, the Universe and Everything (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #3)]]> 8694
“Wild satire . . . The feckless protagonist, Arthur Dent, is reminiscent of Vonnegut heroes.”— Chicago Tribune

The unhappy inhabitants of planet Krikkit are sick of looking at the night sky above their heads—so they plan to destroy it. The universe, that is. Now only five individuals stand between the killer robots of Krikkit and their goal of total annihilation.

They are Arthur Dent, a mild-mannered space and time traveler who tries to learn how to fly by throwing himself at the ground and missing; Ford Prefect, his best friend, who decides to go insane to see if he likes it; Slartibartfast, the indomitable vice president of the Campaign for Real Time, who travels in a ship powered by irrational behavior; Zaphod Beeblebrox, the two-headed, three-armed ex-president of the galaxy; and Trillian, the sexy space cadet who is torn between a persistent Thunder God and a very depressed Beeblebrox.

How will it all end? Will it end? Only this stalwart crew knows as they try to avert “universal” Armageddon and save life as we know it—and don’t know it!

“Adams is one of those rare an author who, one senses, has as much fun writing as one has reading.”— Arizona Daily Star]]> 224 Douglas Adams 0345418905 Rupert 5 4.20 1982 Life, the Universe and Everything (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #3)
author: Douglas Adams
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1982
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #4)]]> 8698
"HE LOST ALL FAITH IN THE STRAIGHTFORWARD OPERATION OF CAUSE AND EFFECT THE DAY HE GOT UP INTENDING TO CATCH UP WITH SOME READING AND ENDED UP ON A PREHISTORIC EARTH WITH A MAN FROM BETELGEUSE AND A SPACESHIP-LOAD OF ALIEN TELEPHONE SANITISERS...".

Left at the end of LIFE, THE UNIVERSE AND EVERYTHING with the address for God's Final Message To His Creation, Arthur Dent let this crucial information slip his mind. He tries everything to jog his memory - meditation, mind-reading, hitting himself about the head with blunt objects. But none of it works. Of course, as everyone knows, the answer lies in making life flash before your eyes...
Source: douglasadams.com]]> 167 Douglas Adams 0330491237 Rupert 4 4.09 1984 So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #4)
author: Douglas Adams
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.09
book published: 1984
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Mostly Harmless (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #5)]]> 360
Hell takes a number of forms: there’s the usual Ford Prefect form of hell, fresh hell in the form of an all-new version of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and a totally unexpected hell in the form of a teenage girl who startles Arthur Dent by being his daughter when he didn’t even know he had one.

Can Arthur save the Earth from total multidimensional obliteration? Can he save the Guide from a hostile alien takeover? Can he save his daughter, Random, from herself?

Of course not. He never works out what is going on, exactly. Will you?]]> 240 Douglas Adams Rupert 4 3.98 1992 Mostly Harmless (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, #5)
author: Douglas Adams
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1992
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks]]> 3297175
The next day, his clothes stained with blood, Carr went to his friends Bill Burroughs and Jack Kerouac for help. Doing so, he involved them in the crime. A few months later, they were caught up in the crime in a different way.

Something about the murder captivated the Beats, especially Kerouac and Burroughs, who decided to collaborate on a novel about the events of the previous summer. At the time, the two authors were still unknown, yet to write anything of note. Narrating alternating chapters, they pieced together a hard-boiled tale of bohemian New York during World War II, full of drugs and art, obsession and violence, with scenes and characters drawn from their own lives.

They submitted their manuscript—called And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks after an absurd line from a radio bulletin about a circus fire—to publishers, but it was rejected and confined to a filing cabinet for decades. Finally published, at long last, And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks tells the story of Ramsay Allen and the object of his fixation, the charismatic, idealistic young Phillip Tourian. Phillip and his friends drink and dream in the bars and apartments of the West Village, until, with his friend Mike Ryko (Kerouac's narrator), he hatches a plan to ship out as a merchant marine. They'll catch a boat for France and jump ship, then make their way through the front to Paris.

And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks is an engaging, fast-paced read that shows the two authors' developing styles. It is also an incomparable artifact, a legendary novel from the dawn of the Beat movement by two hugely influential writers.]]> 214 William S. Burroughs 0802118763 Rupert 4 3.74 1945 And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks
author: William S. Burroughs
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.74
book published: 1945
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Ringworld Engineers (Ringworld, #2)]]> 61181 307 Larry Niven 0345418417 Rupert 3 3.89 1979 The Ringworld Engineers (Ringworld, #2)
author: Larry Niven
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1979
rating: 3
read at: 2012/01/01
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Mysterious Island (Captain Nemo, #3)]]> 32831
What unfolds in Jules Verne’s imaginative marvel is both an enthralling mystery and the ultimate in survivalist adventures.]]> 723 Jules Verne 0812972120 Rupert 4 4.14 1874 The Mysterious Island (Captain Nemo, #3)
author: Jules Verne
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1874
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> Fight Club 5759 218 Chuck Palahniuk 0393327345 Rupert 5 4.19 1996 Fight Club
author: Chuck Palahniuk
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1996
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> Requiem for a Dream 46945
Entranced by the gleaming visions of their futures, these four convince themselves that unexpected setbacks are only temporary. Even as their lives slowly deteriorate around them, they cling to their delusions and become utterly consumed in a spiral of drugs and addiction, refusing to see that they have instead created their own worst nightmares.

"Selby's place is in the front rank of American novelists . . . To understand Selby's work is to understand the anguish of America." —The New York Times Book Review]]> 279 Hubert Selby Jr. 1560252480 Rupert 4 4.11 1978 Requiem for a Dream
author: Hubert Selby Jr.
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1978
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Quantity Theory of Insanity]]> 119117
In The Quantity Theory of Insanity , Will Self tips over the banal surfaces of everyday existence to uncover the hideous, the hilarious, and the bizarre. Psychiatry, anthropology, theology--and literature--will never be the same.]]> 224 Will Self 0679750940 Rupert 4 3.70 1991 The Quantity Theory of Insanity
author: Will Self
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1991
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> On Seeing and Noticing 292583 56 Alain de Botton 0141023074 Rupert 4 3.74 2005 On Seeing and Noticing
author: Alain de Botton
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2005
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Consolations of Philosophy]]> 23419 The Consolations of Philosophy takes the discipline of logic and the mind back to its roots. Drawing inspiration from six of the finest minds in history - Socrates, Epicurus, Seneca, Montaigne, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche - he addresses lack of money, the pain of love, inadequacy, anxiety and conformity. De Botton's book led one critic to call philosophy 'the new rock and roll'.]]> 265 Alain de Botton Rupert 4 4.04 2000 The Consolations of Philosophy
author: Alain de Botton
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2000
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Dawn of the Dumb: Dispatches from the Idiotic Frontline]]> 945249 345 Charlie Brooker 0571238416 Rupert 5 3.97 2007 Dawn of the Dumb: Dispatches from the Idiotic Frontline
author: Charlie Brooker
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2007
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution]]> 6117055
"The Greatest Show on Earth" is a stunning counter-attack on creationists, followers of "Intelligent Design" and all those who still question evolution as scientific fact. In this brilliant tour de force, Richard Dawkins pulls together the incontrovertible evidence that underpins it: from living examples of natural selection to clues in the fossil record; from plate tectonics to molecular genetics.

"The Greatest Show on Earth" comes at a critical time as systematic opposition to the fact of evolution flourishes as never before in many schools worldwide. Dawkins wields a devastating argument against this ignorance whilst sharing with us his palpable love of science and the natural world. Written with elegance, wit and passion, it is hard-hitting, absorbing and totally convincing.]]> 470 Richard Dawkins 059306173X Rupert 5 4.15 2009 The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution
author: Richard Dawkins
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2009
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Who Moved My Cheese? An Amazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and in Your Life...]]> 4894
Two are mice named Sniff and Scurry. And two are "Littlepeople" — beings the size of mice who look and act a lot like people. Their names are Hem and Haw.

"Cheese" is a metaphor for what you want to have in life — whether it's a good job, a loving relationship, money, a possession, health, or spiritual peace of mind.

And the "Maze" is where you look for what you want — the organisation you work in or the family or community you live in.

In the story, the characters are faced with unexpected change. Eventually, one of them deals with it successfully, and writes what he has learned from his experience on the Maze walls.

When you come to see "The Handwriting on the Wall," you can discover for yourself how to deal with change, so that you can enjoy less stress and more success (however you define it) in your work and in your life.

Written for all ages, the story takes less than an hour to read, but its unique insights can last for a lifetime.]]> 98 Spencer Johnson 0091883768 Rupert 4 3.88 1999 Who Moved My Cheese? An Amazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and in Your Life...
author: Spencer Johnson
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1999
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> The Complete Maus 15195
The Pulitzer Prize-winning Maus tells the story of Vladek Spiegelman, a Jewish survivor of Hitler’s Europe, and his son, a cartoonist coming to terms with his father’s story. Maus approaches the unspeakable through the diminutive. Its form, the cartoon (the Nazis are cats, the Jews mice), shocks us out of any lingering sense of familiarity and succeeds in “drawing us closer to the bleak heart of the Holocaust” (The New York Times).

Maus is a haunting tale within a tale. Vladek’s harrowing story of survival is woven into the author’s account of his tortured relationship with his aging father. Against the backdrop of guilt brought by survival, they stage a normal life of small arguments and unhappy visits. This astonishing retelling of our century’s grisliest news is a story of survival, not only of Vladek but of the children who survive even the survivors. Maus studies the bloody pawprints of history and tracks its meaning for all of us.]]> 296 Art Spiegelman 0141014083 Rupert 5 4.57 1980 The Complete Maus
author: Art Spiegelman
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.57
book published: 1980
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> Of Mice and Men 890 “I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you, and that's why.”

They are an unlikely pair: George is "small and quick and dark of face"; Lennie, a man of tremendous size, has the mind of a young child. Yet they have formed a "family," clinging together in the face of loneliness and alienation. Laborers in California's dusty vegetable fields, they hustle work when they can, living a hand-to-mouth existence. But George and Lennie have a plan: to own an acre of land and a shack they can call their own.

While the powerlessness of the laboring class is a recurring theme in Steinbeck's work of the late 1930s, he narrowed his focus when composing Of Mice and Men, creating an intimate portrait of two men facing a world marked by petty tyranny, misunderstanding, jealousy, and callousness. But though the scope is narrow, the theme is universal: a friendship and a shared dream that makes an individual's existence meaningful.

A unique perspective on life's hardships, this story has achieved the status of timeless classic due to its remarkable success as a novel, a Broadway play, and three acclaimed films.]]> 107 John Steinbeck 0142000671 Rupert 4 3.88 1937 Of Mice and Men
author: John Steinbeck
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1937
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> Animal Liberation 29380 The Book That Started A Revolution

Since its original publication in 1975, this groundbreaking work has awakened millions of concerned men and women to the shocking abuse of animals everywhere -- inspiring a worldwide movement to eliminate much of the cruel and unnecessary laboratory animal experimentation of years past.

In this newly revised and expanded edition, author Peter Singer exposes the chilling realities of today's "factory forms" and product-testing procedures -- offering sound, humane solutions to what has become a profound environmental and social as well as moral issue. An important and persuasive appeal to conscience, fairness, decency and justice, Animal Liberation is essential reading for the supporter and the skeptic alike.

]]> 324 Peter Singer 0060011572 Rupert 5 4.29 1975 Animal Liberation
author: Peter Singer
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1975
rating: 5
read at: 2010/01/01
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[If Nobody Speaks Of Remarkable Things]]> 103345
In delicate, intricately observed close-up, this novel makes us privy to the private lives of residents of a quiet street over the course of a single day.

If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things explores the hopes, fears, and unspoken despairs of a diverse a single father with painfully scarred hands; a group of young club-goers just home from an all-night rave, sweetly high and mulling over vague dreams; and the nervous young man at number 18 who collects weird urban junk and is haunted by the specter of unrequited love. What eventually unites them is an utterly surprising and terrible twist of fate that shatters their everyday, ordinary tranquility, and all that they take for granted.

A prose poem of a novel with a mystery at its center that “recalls To The Lighthouse or Mrs. Dalloway ” ( The Times ), If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things was the recipient of the Somerset Maugham Award and the Betty Trask Award, and was named one of the best books of the year by the Los Angeles Times.]]> 275 Jon McGregor 0618344586 Rupert 3 3.93 2002 If Nobody Speaks Of Remarkable Things
author: Jon McGregor
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2002
rating: 3
read at: 2012/11/10
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Almost a Revolution: The Story of a Chinese Student's Journey from Boyhood to Leadership in Tiananmen Square (Ann Arbor Paperbacks)]]> 801748 Now nearly ten years later as our fascination with post-Deng China continues to develop, Shen's story and the updated material he provides are weighted with increasing significance. Coupled with much of the recent analysis, Shen's firsthand account vividly contextualizes the Chinese government's opposition to democracy and offers meaningful insight into a country that promises to occupy an increasingly prominent position in the world.
"A cause for celebration . . . an important contribution to China's newly discovered historical memory." -- New York Times Book Review
Shen Tong is a doctoral student in political sociology at Boston University and the founder of the Democracy for China Fund, which aims to support and publicize dissent networks in China. Marianne Yen is a former New York correspondent for the Washington Post .]]> 344 Shen Tong 0472085573 Rupert 5 4.24 1990 Almost a Revolution: The Story of a Chinese Student's Journey from Boyhood to Leadership in Tiananmen Square (Ann Arbor Paperbacks)
author: Shen Tong
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1990
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Jurassic Park (Jurassic Park, #1)]]> 7677
Parque jurásico, la novela más célebre de Michael Crichton y una de las más leídas en los últimos a?os, fue adaptada al cine por Steven Spielberg en una película que se convirtió en el gran acontecimiento cinematográfico de 1993 y en el origen del fenómeno de masas llamado ?dinomanía?.]]> 467 Michael Crichton 030734813X Rupert 2 3.90 1990 Jurassic Park (Jurassic Park, #1)
author: Michael Crichton
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1990
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2013/01/22
shelves:
review:

]]> A Brief History of Time 3869
Told in language we all can understand, A Brief History of Time plunges into the exotic realms of black holes and quarks, of antimatter and “arrows of time,” of the big bang and a bigger God—where the possibilities are wondrous and unexpected. With exciting images and profound imagination, Stephen Hawking brings us closer to the ultimate secrets at the very heart of creation.]]> 226 Stephen Hawking 0553380168 Rupert 5 4.22 1988 A Brief History of Time
author: Stephen Hawking
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1988
rating: 5
read at: 2013/01/13
date added: 2013/01/14
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Oryx and Crake (MaddAddam, #1)]]> 46756 Oryx and Crake is at once an unforgettable love story and a compelling vision of the future. Snowman, known as Jimmy before mankind was overwhelmed by a plague, is struggling to survive in a world where he may be the last human, and mourning the loss of his best friend, Crake, and the beautiful and elusive Oryx whom they both loved. In search of answers, Snowman embarks on a journey–with the help of the green-eyed Children of Crake–through the lush wilderness that was so recently a great city, until powerful corporations took mankind on an uncontrolled genetic engineering ride. Margaret Atwood projects us into a near future that is both all too familiar and beyond our imagining.]]> 389 Margaret Atwood Rupert 5 4.01 2003 Oryx and Crake (MaddAddam, #1)
author: Margaret Atwood
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2003
rating: 5
read at: 2013/01/08
date added: 2013/01/09
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Revolution of Everyday Life]]> 381416 279 Raoul Vaneigem 0939306069 Rupert 0 to-read 4.17 1967 The Revolution of Everyday Life
author: Raoul Vaneigem
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1967
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/12/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Junky 23940 Naked Lunch, an unknown William S. Burroughs wrote Junky, his first novel. It is a candid eye-witness account of times and places that are now long gone, an unvarnished field report from the American post-war underground. Unafraid to portray himself in 1953 as a confirmed member of two socially-despised under classes (a narcotics addict and a homosexual), Burroughs was writing as a trained anthropologist when he unapologetically described a way of life - in New York, New Orleans, and Mexico City - that by the 1940's was already demonized by the artificial anti-drug hysteria of an opportunistic bureaucracy and a cynical, prostrate media. For this fiftieth-anniversary edition, eminent Burroughs scholar Oliver Harris has painstakingly recreated the author's original text, word by word, from archival typescripts and places the book's contents against a lively historical background in a comprehensive introduction. Here as well, for the first time, are Burroughs' own unpublished introduction and an entire omitted chapter, along with many "lost" passages, as well as auxiliary texts by Allen Ginsberg and others.]]> 166 William S. Burroughs 0142003166 Rupert 0 to-read 3.87 1953 Junky
author: William S. Burroughs
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1953
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/12/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Destructors 254031
The humor of Mark Twain...the suspense of Edgar Allan Poe...the danger of Jack London...the sensitivity of Katherine Mansfield. Creative Short Stories has it all and will prove to be a welcome addition to any library.]]> 40 Graham Greene 088682348X Rupert 4 3.84 1955 The Destructors
author: Graham Greene
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1955
rating: 4
read at: 2012/10/18
date added: 2012/10/18
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Journey from Darkness to Light]]> 8469401 242 Mahmoud Mansi Rupert 0 to-read 3.70 2010 A Journey from Darkness to Light
author: Mahmoud Mansi
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2010
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/10/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Darkmans (Thames Gateway, #3) 1139452 838 Nicola Barker 0007193629 Rupert 0 to-read 3.65 2007 Darkmans (Thames Gateway, #3)
author: Nicola Barker
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/07/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Last Exit to Brooklyn 50275 Last Exit to Brooklyn, and this Penguin Modern Classics edition includes an introduction by Irvine Welsh, author of Trainspotting.

Described by various reviewers as hellish and obscene, Last Exit to Brooklyn tells the stories of New Yorkers who at every turn confront the worst excesses in human nature. Yet there are moments of exquisite tenderness in these troubled lives. Georgette, the transvestite who falls in love with a callous hoodlum; Tralala, the conniving prostitute who plumbs the depths of sexual degradation; and Harry, the strike leader who hides his true desires behind a boorish masculinity, are unforgettable creations. Last Exit to Brooklyn was banned by British courts in 1967, a decision that was reversed the following year with the help of a number of writers and critics including Anthony Burgess and Frank Kermode.

Hubert Selby, Jr. (1928-2004) was born in Brooklyn, New York. At the age of 15, he dropped out of school and went to sea with the merchant marines. While at sea he was diagnosed with lung disease. With no other way to make a living, he decided to try writing: 'I knew the alphabet. Maybe I could be a writer.' In 1964 he completed his first book, Last Exit to Brooklyn, which has since become a cult classic. In 1966, it was the subject of an obscenity trial in the UK. His other books include The Room, The Demon, Requiem for a Dream, The Willow Tree and Waiting Period. In 2000, Requiem for a Dream was adapted into a film starring Jared Leto and Ellen Burstyn, and directed by Darren Aronofsky.

'Last Exit to Brooklyn will explode like a rusty hellish bombshell over America, and still be eagerly read in 100 years'
Allen Ginsberg

'An urgent tickertape from hell'
Spectator]]> 290 Hubert Selby Jr. 0747549923 Rupert 0 to-read 3.94 1964 Last Exit to Brooklyn
author: Hubert Selby Jr.
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.94
book published: 1964
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/07/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Day of the Triffids 530965
The triffids are grotesque and dangerous plants, over seven feet tall, originally cultivated for their yield of high-grade oil. So long as conditions give the mastery to their human directors, they are a valuable asset to mankind. But when a sudden universal disaster turns those conditions upside down, then the triffids, seizing their opportunity, become an active and dreadful menace.

The story of what happens is told here by one of the few people lucky enough to escape the disaster.]]> 228 John Wyndham 0812967127 Rupert 0 to-read 4.01 1951 The Day of the Triffids
author: John Wyndham
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.01
book published: 1951
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/07/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 1984 5470 328 George Orwell Rupert 4 4.15 1949 1984
author: George Orwell
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.15
book published: 1949
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/07/13
shelves:
review:

]]> I Am Legend and Other Stories 547094 Robert Neville is the last living man on Earth...but he is not alone. Every other man, woman, and child on Earth has become a vampire, and they are all hungry for Neville's blood.

By day, he is the hunter, stalking the sleeping undead through the abandoned ruins of civilization. By night, he barricades himself in his home and prays for dawn.

How long can one man survive in a world of vampires?

I am legend --
Buried talents --
The near departed --
Prey --
Witch war --
Dance of the dead --
Dress of white silk --
Mad house --
The funeral --
From shadowed places --
Person to person.]]> 317 Richard Matheson 031286504X Rupert 0 to-read 4.02 1954 I Am Legend and Other Stories
author: Richard Matheson
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1954
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/07/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Brief History of the Dead 30072
The City is inhabited by those who have departed Earth but are still remembered by the living. They will reside in this afterlife until they are completely forgotten. But the City is shrinking, and the residents clearing out. Some of the holdouts, like Luka Sims, who produces the City’s only newspaper, are wondering what exactly is going on. Others, like Coleman Kinzler, believe it is the beginning of the end.

Meanwhile, Laura Byrd is trapped in an Antarctic research station, her supplies are running low, her radio finds only static, and the power is failing. With little choice, Laura sets out across the ice to look for help, but time is running out.

Kevin Brockmeier alternates these two storylines to create a lyrical and haunting story about love, loss and the power of memory.]]> 252 Kevin Brockmeier 1400095956 Rupert 0 to-read 3.68 2003 The Brief History of the Dead
author: Kevin Brockmeier
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2003
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2012/07/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Prey 83763
It has been programmed as a predator. It is evolving swiftly, becoming more deadly with each passing hour.

Every attempt to destroy it has failed.

And we are the prey.]]> 507 Michael Crichton 0061015725 Rupert 4 3.78 2002 Prey
author: Michael Crichton
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2002
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/07/13
shelves:
review:

]]> Le Grand Meaulnes 794779 206 Alain-Fournier 0140182829 Rupert 4 3.78 1913 Le Grand Meaulnes
author: Alain-Fournier
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.78
book published: 1913
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/07/13
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Gunslinger (The Dark Tower, #1)]]> 43615
He is a haunting figure, a loner on a spellbinding journey into good and evil. In his desolate world, which frighteningly mirrors our own, Roland pursues The Man in Black, encounters an alluring woman named Alice, and begins a friendship with the Kid from Earth called Jake. Both grippingly realistic and eerily dreamlike, The Gunslinger leaves readers eagerly awaiting the next chapter.]]> 231 Stephen King 1501143514 Rupert 4 3.95 1982 The Gunslinger (The Dark Tower, #1)
author: Stephen King
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.95
book published: 1982
rating: 4
read at: 2012/07/09
date added: 2012/07/10
shelves:
review:

]]> After the Quake 11299 147 Haruki Murakami Rupert 5 3.81 2000 After the Quake
author: Haruki Murakami
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2000
rating: 5
read at: 2012/06/26
date added: 2012/06/26
shelves:
review:

]]> Kneller's Happy Campers 6324467 Kneller's Happy Campers is a strange, dark but funny tale set in a world very much like our own but it's an afterlife populated by people who have killed themselves - many of them are young, and most of them bear the marks of their death... bullet wounds, broken necks...(those who have over-dosed are known as 'Juliets').

When Mordy, our hero, discovers that his girlfriend from his life before has also 'offed' herself, he sets out to find her, and so follows a strange adventure...

Full of the weird and wonderful characters, and the slightly surreal twist of events that we've come to expect from Etgar Keret, this novella is full of humour and comic flashes, but it is also wistful, longing for a better world and perfect love.]]> 96 Etgar Keret 0701184310 Rupert 4 4.09 1998 Kneller's Happy Campers
author: Etgar Keret
name: Rupert
average rating: 4.09
book published: 1998
rating: 4
read at: 2011/01/01
date added: 2012/06/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions]]> 433567 [sic – ed.], a mathematician and resident of the two-dimensional Flatland, where women-thin, straight lines-are the lowliest of shapes, and where men may have any number of sides, depending on their social status.
Through strange occurrences that bring him into contact with a host of geometric forms, Square has adventures in Spaceland (three dimensions), Lineland (one dimension) and Pointland (no dimensions) and ultimately entertains thoughts of visiting a land of four dimensions—a revolutionary idea for which he is returned to his two-dimensional world. Charmingly illustrated by the author, Flatland is not only fascinating reading, it is still a first-rate fictional introduction to the concept of the multiple dimensions of space. "Instructive, entertaining, and stimulating to the imagination." — Mathematics Teacher.]]> 96 Edwin A. Abbott 048627263X Rupert 4 3.82 1884 Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions
author: Edwin A. Abbott
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.82
book published: 1884
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/06/11
shelves:
review:

]]> Ringworld (Ringworld, #1) 61179 288 Larry Niven 0575077026 Rupert 3 3.96 1970 Ringworld (Ringworld, #1)
author: Larry Niven
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1970
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2012/06/11
shelves:
review:

]]> Flashforward 337132
Two minutes and seventeen seconds that changed the world

Suddenly, without warning, all seven billion people on Earth black out for more than two minutes. Millions die as planes fall from the sky, people tumble down staircases, and cars plow into each other.

But that’s the least of the survivors’ challenges. During the blackout, everyone experienced a glimpse of what his or her future holds—and the interlocking mosaic of these visions threatens to unravel the present.]]> 320 Robert J. Sawyer 0812580346 Rupert 3 3.68 1999 Flashforward
author: Robert J. Sawyer
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.68
book published: 1999
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2012/06/11
shelves:
review:

]]> The God Delusion 14743
With rigor and wit, Dawkins examines God in all his forms, from the sex-obsessed tyrant of the Old Testament, to the more benign (but still illogical) Celestial Watchmaker favored by some Enlightenment thinkers. He eviscerates the major arguments for religion, and demonstrates the supreme improbability of a supreme being. He shows how religion fuels war, foments bigotry, and abuses children, buttressing his points with historical and contemporary evidence.

The God Delusion makes a compelling case that belief in God is not just wrong, but potentially deadly. It also offers exhilarating insight into the advantages of atheism to the individual and society, not the least of which is a clearer, truer appreciation of the universe's wonders than any faith could ever muster.]]> 374 Richard Dawkins 0618680004 Rupert 5 3.89 2006 The God Delusion
author: Richard Dawkins
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/06/11
shelves:
review:

]]> The Book of Dave 119114 496 Will Self 1596911239 Rupert 4 3.61 2006 The Book of Dave
author: Will Self
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2006
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2012/06/11
shelves:
review:

]]> Coming up for Air 509080 ]]> 278 George Orwell 0156196255 Rupert 3 3.80 1939 Coming up for Air
author: George Orwell
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.80
book published: 1939
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2012/06/09
shelves:
review:

]]> Choke 29059 Victor Mancini, a medical-school dropout, is an antihero for our deranged times.

Needing to pay elder care for his mother, Victor has devised an ingenious scam: he pretends to choke on pieces of food while dining in upscale restaurants. He then allows himself to be “saved” by fellow patrons who, feeling responsible for Victor’s life, go on to send checks to support him.

When he’s not pulling this stunt, Victor cruises sexual addiction recovery workshops for action, visits his addled mom, and spends his days working at a colonial theme park.

His creator, Chuck Palahniuk, renowned author of classics like Fight Club, is the visionary we need and the satirist we deserve.]]> 293 Chuck Palahniuk 0385720920 Rupert 5 3.71 2001 Choke
author: Chuck Palahniuk
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/06/09
shelves:
review:

]]> Invisible Monsters 22290
Enter Brandy Alexander, Queen Supreme, one operation away from being a real woman, who will teach her that reinventing yourself means erasing your past and making up something better, and that salvation hides in the last place you'll ever want to look.

The narrator must exact revenge upon Evie, her best friend and fellow model; kidnap Manus, her two-timing ex-boyfriend; and hit the road with Brandy in search of a brand-new past, present and future.]]> 297 Chuck Palahniuk 0099285444 Rupert 5 3.97 1999 Invisible Monsters
author: Chuck Palahniuk
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1999
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2012/06/09
shelves:
review:

]]> The Time Machine 2493
So begins the Time Traveller’s astonishing firsthand account of his journey 800,000 years beyond his own era—and the story that launched H.G. Wells’s successful career and earned him his reputation as the father of science fiction. With a speculative leap that still fires the imagination, Wells sends his brave explorer to face a future burdened with our greatest hopes...and our darkest fears. A pull of the Time Machine’s lever propels him to the age of a slowly dying Earth.? There he discovers two bizarre races—the ethereal Eloi and the subterranean Morlocks—who not only symbolize the duality of human nature, but offer a terrifying portrait of the men of tomorrow as well.? Published in 1895, this masterpiece of invention captivated readers on the threshold of a new century. Thanks to Wells’s expert storytelling and provocative insight, The Time Machine will continue to enthrall readers for generations to come.

?]]> 118 H.G. Wells Rupert 4 3.91 1895 The Time Machine
author: H.G. Wells
name: Rupert
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1895
rating: 4
read at: 2012/01/01
date added: 2012/06/09
shelves:
review:

]]>