Book thread: what are you reading?

[Amber Avenger]

2 hours ago, Oxford said:

Costa have books of the year! Who knew?

The award formerly known as the Whitbread Prize so have been around a while pre-Costa

[Oxford]

A Narrative of a Revolutionary Soldier  - Joseph Plumb Martin

&

Teacher Tom's First Book - Tom Hobson

Both a bit nerdy and specialist in fact but great for those with an interest  the War of Independence and the importance of play in children's learning and well being.

[Ex-Kirkholt]

6 hours ago, Amber Avenger said:

The award formerly known as the Whitbread Prize so have been around a while pre-Costa

Don't Whitbread own Costa ?

[Oxford]

10 hours ago, Trojan said:

The Serpent's Promise (the Bible retold as science)  by Professor Steve Jones.  A fascinating read by a fascinating man.

Looked this up cos it sounded interesting and kindled it so thanks for that one.

 

 

Edited October 23, 2017 by Oxford

[Oxford]

23 hours ago, Saintslass said:

I've just finished reading Days Without End by Sebastian Barry.

And this is next .... so thanks to you too!

Edited October 23, 2017 by Oxford

[Phil]

11 hours ago, Oxford said:

 

 

by the way that is the one where he says the guillotine was invented in Yorkshire?

 

 

It was the Halifax gibbet 

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halifax_Gibbet

Edited October 23, 2017 by Phil

[Oxford]

35 minutes ago, Phil said:

It was the Halifax gibbet 

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halifax_Gibbet

Judging by the number of head high tackles in the last match I saw at Thrum Hall the tradition lasted much longer than the Wiki article suggests.

[Phil]

21 minutes ago, Oxford said:

Judging by the number of head high tackles in the last match I saw at Thrum Hall the tradition lasted much longer than the Wiki article suggests.

Thrum Hall? Where’ve you been? 

[Moose]

On 22/10/2017 at 8:10 PM, Saintslass said:

I've just finished reading Days Without End by Sebastian Barry.  It was the Costa book of the year last year.  I'm not sure what I thought of it really other than it's a bit of a traumatic read.  I suppose it has a happy ending but I'm not totally sure!  The writing style is different; it's first person colloquial Irish migrant to the US around the time of the civil war.  I did find myself feeling very much inside the protagonist's head which was not always a place I wanted to be!  It was one of those books that didn't really have a start, middle and end but could have just run on and on.  

As I say, I'm not sure what I thought of it.

I've just finished reading Joseph O'Connor's Star of the Sea, a book about the Irish potato famine set in 1845. It describes in harrowing detail the abject poverty and complete servitude that the majority of the locals had to contend with. Their only hope was to try and buy a passage in steerage on one of the many ships making the transatlantic crossing to the "promised land". 

One of the best books I've ever read. The name of Pius Mulvey will stay in my memory for a long time.

If you haven't read it, then do, you won't regret it.

[Gerrumonside ref]

How to watch football by Ruud Gullitt.

I’m not sure he’s read it!

To be fair it’s very good once he gets onto tactics and sharing insights into his Milan days.

A few interesting anecdotes about Cruyff too.

[Trojan]

1 hour ago, Phil said:

Thrum Hall? Where’ve you been? 

Looking round ASDA by the sound of it. BTW there's still a Gibbet Street in 'Fax.

[Phil]

1 hour ago, Trojan said:

Looking round ASDA by the sound of it. BTW there's still a Gibbet Street in 'Fax.

Yeah I go up the top end of it to get home every night 

[The Future is League]

I've just finished reading Gray Mountain by John Grisham and a excellent read and i am about to start reading The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad.

[Oxford]

9 hours ago, Phil said:

Thrum Hall? Where’ve you been? 

Jokes a bit lost on you?

[Futtocks]

9 hours ago, The Future is League said:

I've just finished reading Gray Mountain by John Grisham and a excellent read and i am about to start reading The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad.

I read The Secret Agent years ago and, while I don't recall the details at this distance, I did enjoy it.

[Phil]

3 hours ago, Oxford said:

Jokes a bit lost on you?

funny ones aren't

[Farmduck]

9 hours ago, The Future is League said:

I've just finished reading Gray Mountain by John Grisham and a excellent read and i am about to start reading The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad.

I also read a lot of Conrad decades ago. The Secret Agent, Lord Jim, Heart of Darkness, the N-word of the Narcissus and I think I read Under Western Eyes too.

[Oxford]

19 minutes ago, Phil said:

funny ones aren't

On the question of books

Just got a shed load of those freebies from Amazon always well worth a look!

Edited October 24, 2017 by Oxford

[JonM]

On 9/16/2017 at 11:54 AM, Copa said:

A collection of Sherlock Holmes stories translated into Indonesian.

Do many Aussies speak Bahasa Indonesia? My limited exposure made me think it looked easier to learn than some other languages?

The new Philip Pullman book "La Belle Sauvage" just arrived for me.

 

[Oxford]

7 minutes ago, JonM said:

The new Philip Pullman book "La Belle Sauvage" just arrived for me.

Tell us a bit about it then, please?

[JonM]

9 minutes ago, Oxford said:

Tell us a bit about it then, please?

I'll need to open it first!

Mr Pullman taught my wife at school in Oxford and immediately remembered her when she said hello to him nearly 40 years later.

[Farmduck]

24 minutes ago, JonM said:

Do many Aussies speak Bahasa Indonesia? My limited exposure made me think it looked easier to learn than some other languages?

The new Philip Pullman book "La Belle Sauvage" just arrived for me.

 

I studied it at Uni 40 years ago. It's available in High Schools. It it relatively easy, on a par with Italian which is pretty straight forward. (although I studied Latin for 6 years so maybe that's why I found Italian easy.) I also studied French in High School and I'd say Indonesian is easier than French.

[Copa]

24 minutes ago, JonM said:

Do many Aussies speak Bahasa Indonesia? My limited exposure made me think it looked easier to learn than some other languages?

The new Philip Pullman book "La Belle Sauvage" just arrived for me.

 

It’s rare to find an Australian who can read an Indonesian language novel. Quite a few can say the basics on a Balinese street though.

Indonesian has the benefits of being an easy and forgiving language for beginners which makes many think they speak it well or that the language is easy. However if you give them the Indonesian media equivalent of The Times they don’t understand a word.

The reality is that while it is easy to start it is hard to finish. A number of foreign governments lists it as harder to learn than languages like French and Spanish.

It is a fun language. Very different grammar to English and has a lack of tenses. The verbs don’t change.

[Futtocks]

3 hours ago, Farmduck said:

I also read a lot of Conrad decades ago. The Secret Agent, Lord Jim, Heart of Darkness, the N-word of the Narcissus and I think I read Under Western Eyes too.

'Under Western Eyes' is excellent. 'Nostromo' is also worth reading, although it it is a bit more long-winded than it needs to be at times, IMO.

As well as a collection of columns about terrible B-movies (what, me?), I am also about a quarter of the way through 'New Grub Street' by George Gissing, which I am enjoying quite a lot.

[Phil]

Mythago Wood by Robert Holdstock a fantasy novel which uses Jung’s theory of archetypes as its foundation