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Finished Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? over the weekend, and have finally finished my review: here

Superb. And un-nerving. Looking forward to the film this weekend.

Finished The Water Knife yesterday. It was an uncomfortable read about the decent of America into chaos with a long term rough in the south west. My review is here

Read The Tooth Tattoo, a detective story, in the Peter Diamond series. I'm a fan of the author, Peter Lovesey, but have thought the last couple I'd read weren't quite up to the mark. However i really enjoyed this one - convincing plot and an interesting musical quartet setting.

I finally finished The Wind-up Bird Chronicle. I had to recheck it a couple of times and gave up on it once. Then went ahead and finished it. Felt like it was a complete waste of my time. Happily reading Far From the Madding Crowd now. Love Thomas Hardy!

I love Thomas Hardy too.

I pass one of the places he used to live regularly

Paul wrote: "I pass one of the places he used to live regularly"

That is so cool!

Patricia wrote: "Paul wrote: "I pass one of the places he used to live regularly"

That is so cool!"

He lived here:

Finished The Establishment: And How They Get Away with It tonight. Read it is all I will say. My review is here

Brilliant, absolutely brilliant. I am a Neil Gaiman fan anyway, but that was brilliant. My review is here

Finished The Hand That First Held Mine by Maggie O'Farrell. Loved it - 4.5 stars. Her writing is really good.

I liked that one Jackie, read a couple others of hers afterwards and that is still my favourite. Really good.

I have recently finished Summertime which I really enjoyed, very well written and portrayed the period in question so well.

Also the audio drama amok which was pretty punchy stuff and The Rosie Effect which was ok, but nowhere near as entertaining as the first one.

I conquered Don Quijote!! It was a hard fight, but I came out the winner ;)
(Can recommend vol. 1 - it's a good book - vol. 2 I could have done without.)

Well done! Use of the word conquered makes it feel quite daunting though

Paul wrote: "Well done! Use of the word conquered makes it feel quite daunting though"
Around 900 pages from 1605-1615... It was. Glad I'm a fast reader!

Looks like you read at a similar speed to me.

Anetq wrote: "I conquered Don Quijote!! It was a hard fight, but I came out the winner ;)
(Can recommend vol. 1 - it's a good book - vol. 2 I could have done without.)"

Read this for the first time this year. The comedy was way ahead of its time.

Jason wrote: "Read this for the first time this year. The comedy was way ahead of its time."
I found the work really interesting, but the humor tiring - especially in the second volume... That seemed like a sequel the world could have done with out :)

Wasn't there more than 2 volumes? My favourite bit was his healing potion and them throwing up on each other.

Don Quixote is not for me. I understand why peeps like it. I hated it. Both books

Ah 2 volumes but more than one book.

Well two is more than one the last time I looked

It's sort of a two parter one book!

Finished Empire Falls. I enjoyed it:

/review/show...

Finished a few books in the last couple of days, and am slowly catching up on reviews. FinishedThe Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution, which is a reasonable book about the people who brought us the computers, the internet and web. Good book for those that want to find how it all happened. My review is here

The other was Skimming Stones and Other Ways of Being Wild. Not bad overall, but had no real depth to it. My review is here

Finished a couple of books this week, What Nature Does for Britain. A passionate plea for a better environmental plan for the UK. My review is here

The other was a book called The Great Indoors: At home in the modern British house. wasn't bad, and is in a similar vein to Bill Bryson's At Home: A Short History of Private Life. My review is here

I just finished A Crack in the Edge of the World by Simon Winchester. It was good, but there were a few slow spots. I'm looking forward to his new book, Pacific: Silicon Chips and Surfboards, Coral Reefs and Atom Bombs, Brutal Dictators, Fading Empires, and the Coming Collision of the World's Superpowers. (Release date is October 27)

The few of his that I have read have been good, just added his new one on

He's doing a book tour in the US, but not coming to my city. I wonder why he has so many East Coast dates.He also has a few dates in the UK:

I'm originally from Hawaii, so I really want to read this one.

I have just finished reading The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers, which has been on my classic to-read list for a long time, but as it seemed another one of these depressing American novels from the 1930s, I took me a long time to get around to it. Well, it is a depressing American novel from the 1930, BUT it is so much more and the writing is brilliant, especially considering that the writer was in her early 20s when she wrote it. The characterisation was phantastic and the book feels like a walk down streets of an ordinary small town in America at that time, going into various houses and taking part in the lives of several very different characters. Very, very good writing.

Gisela wrote: "I have just finished reading The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers, which has been on my classic to-read list for a long time, but as it seemed another one of these depressing American n..."

I'm glad you liked it, I listened to the audiobook last month and thought it was great too.

I've just finished The Importance of Being Kennedy by Laurie Graham. It's fiction written from the viewpoint of the nanny to the Kennedy children but based on fact (if that makes sense!). I really liked it and didn't realise just quite what a family they are/were. 4 stars from me.

Jackie wrote: "I've just finished The Importance of Being Kennedy by Laurie Graham. It's fiction written from the viewpoint of the nanny to the Kennedy children but based on fact (if that makes sense!). I really ..."

Sounds intereting, going to look that one up.

Just read my first Tess Gerritsen - First to Die (which I can't seem to link to). I wasn't expecting to like it, as the blurb makes her books sound too violent for my taste, but I thought it was a great tense detective / thriller, so hooray, lots more I can read! I think I don't mind descriptions of dead bodies and injuries, but can't cope with graphic violence and especially torture.

Finished a couple in the last few days, You Are Here: Around the World in 92 Minutes: Photographs from the International Space Station which is a great out of this world coffee table book. My review is here

and Reading the World: Confessions of a Literary Explorer. Thought it was going to be much more about the books that she had read, but wasn't. My review is here

But I do have a idea for a group challenge now, as well as personal challenge!

Finished Bad Banks: Greed, Incompetence and the Next Global Crisis. Makes for uncomfortable reading about the state of the global finance industry. It will make you mad, and probably scare you a bit. My review is here

The Book of Strange New Things is the best book I've read for ages, couldn't put it down.

During the week I finished listening to my first audio book since childhood. I can't tell how was it because I have no idea what actually happened or even who the killer was. It seems that they are not for me.

Tytti wrote: "During the week I finished listening to my first audio book since childhood. I can't tell how was it because I have no idea what actually happened or even who the killer was. It seems that they are..."

Ah well. At least you know now Tytti

Joy wrote: "The Book of Strange New Things is the best book I've read for ages, couldn't put it down."

I have that from the library Joy. haven't got around to reading it though

Yeah, I'm just not able to concentrate only on listening, I have to have something before my eyes. I think it only worked a bit bitter when I was in bed while sick. Also it didn't help that there seemed to be a lot of stuff that had nothing to do with the murder when I was paying attention. Or so I presume.

Joy wrote: "The Book of Strange New Things is the best book I've read for ages, couldn't put it down."

Joy wrote: "The Book of Strange New Things is the best book I've read for ages, couldn't put it down."

Joy, I liked this book too. I'm trying to get my mom to read it. I think she would ask me a million questions about the "aliens".

Tytti. I have done an NLP practitioner course (Look it up on internet!). One of the theories is that people favour a particular sense eg visual,auditory, kinaesthetic etc. They then are able to process things via this more favourable sense more easily than the others.
We all use all senses but many people prefer one over the others. If you are a visual person then more likely to be able to concentrate more on visual information ie books. An auditory person may prefer audiobooks.
This is quite simplistic in how I've explained it but that's basically it. A lot of peeps can do visual and auditory equally ok. Some are kinaesthetic so maybe would need to go to a workshop to experience the book "first hand" - less common in our society but not unknown.

Joy wrote: "The Book of Strange New Things is the best book I've read for ages, couldn't put it down."

It is a bizarre but compelling story. Not normally my sort of thing but I really enjoyed the Radio 4 adaptation.

Didn't realise it was on Radio 4 Jo.

Another one for my to read list!

Pat wrote: "Tytti. I have done an NLP practitioner course (Look it up on internet!). One of the theories is that people favour a particular sense eg visual,auditory, kinaesthetic etc. They then are able to pro..."

Actually I am quite good at just listening lectures, though I do sometime take notes or something, or just watching documentaries with "talking heads". Though a part of it is having got used to reading subtitles because then I can check what happened if I didn't hear. But listening to an audio book I really have nothing to watch and sometimes whatever I am watching becomes more interesting and then I forget to listen. But I remember realising as a child that I must know English quite well when I was doing my homework while "watching" tv and didn't have to read the subtitles.

Amazing re English. My hat off to you.

It's quite common actually. We were a bit surprised in Croatia how good their English was but then they told us that they use subtitles, too, and that explained it. I have learned words like concubine just by watching documentaries etc. When you have listened English and read the subs at the same time for years, you are bound to learn something. The English skills in general are usually much worse in countries that use dubbing.

Finished First Light by Linda Nagata. If we could give 1/2 stars, I'd rate it 3 1/2. A good military sci-fi novel with a definite liberal slant to it (not a bad thing in my mind):

/review/show...

Just finished The Woman Destroyed by Simone de Beauvoir.

Finished Mountains of the Mind a couple of days ago. A very good book of the pleasure and delights of the mountains. Not quite as good as his later books though which are superlative. My review is here