Book recommendations

[Guest DRH 502]

See Felonies, I was supposed to read it then too...but it was sophmore year. I was more concerned with other things than education though so I kinda never got around to it. My mom or someone around here apparently was reading it and I picked it up last week and read a few pages...then couldn't put it down. Its mind-blowing that something like that(holocaust) could have actually happened in the post 1900 world...

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

I didn't read The Catcher in the Rye until college. I was completely underwhelmed.

[snuffbox 0]

Goddam.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

I didn't read The Catcher in the Rye until college. I was completely underwhelmed.

 

I read it once my freshman year of high school and completely identified with it, then read it my freshman year of college and thought Holden was a piece of shit.

[Guest Felonies!]

I didn't read The Catcher in the Rye until college. I was completely underwhelmed.

I agree. I mean, it's a good book, but it doesn't live up to the hype at all. No book could follow through on that level of hype.

[Guest Oblivious Heel]

White Oleander

 

It's a few years old and once was on Oprahs book club. The movie never came close to doing this book justice. The movie had so many holes in the plot because they didn't follow the story of the girl as writen in the book. They left out quite a few chapters in the film.

 

They tried to make it a teary eyed chick flick when the movie could have been a great drama.

[snuffbox 0]

Kerouac's On the Road scroll to be published - http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060726/ap_en_...oks_on_the_road

[Masked Man of Mystery 0]

That wasn't just any girl having any surgery, that was Lucy Mancini of getting-banged-by-Sonny-up-against-the-bedroom-door fame getting her vagina tightened because Sonny stretched it out with his huge cock.

 

Hi..

Hello to you too. It still has nothing to do with the story and could easily be cut. I'm amazed it made it past an editor, frankly, but the rest of the book is still entertaining, generally.

[Guest Felonies!]

Roughly 80 pages into American Pastoral and holy moly, Philip Roth, where have you been all my life?

Today, I bought this.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

You made a very good choice.

[Guest Felonies!]

Actually, I was starting to wonder if I did. It seemed like the first 50 pages or so are just "The Swede was a legend at my school. He inherited a glove factory from his father." over and over and over. It got much better, though.

[Smartly Pretty 0]

Catcher in the Rye is less underwhelming when you read it "early" so to speak. I read it last year (8th Grade) and it's probably my favorite book. It's probably worse when you have to read it for school.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

I have a master's in English literature and I've never read Catcher in the Rye. I think I'm too old for it now, judging by what everyone tells me.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

Salinger handles the English language deftly enough to where Catcher is readable, but that did little to make me want to do anything other than throttle Holden Caulfield.

[Guest Agent of Oblivion]

Yeah Ed, you missed the boat completely when it comes to identifying with the kid. You have to be 13-16 and angsty. Still though, it's the kind of thing one can rip through in a sitting, so why not? Kill a couple hours at the library.

[FroGG_NeaL 0]

AFENI SHAKUR: EVOLUTION OF A REVOLUTIONARY

 

By: Jasmine Guy

 

Jasmine Guy basically interviews Afeni Shakur (2Pac's mom) about her life.

 

Afeni was in The Black Panthers, and 2pac's dad was also a Panther. She was high up in the organisation, and she talks about everything here. She spent her time in jail, so she doesn't have to worry about addmitting to anything. And damn near all of her family are dead or in jail, over thier revolutionary black poer party that was huge during the Civil Rights Era.

 

It's a great read, even if you don't listen to 2pac. The book is about the life of an important figure behind the scenes in African-American rights, told by her. Jasmine Guy is involved because she's a close friend of Afeni. She was a good friend of 2pac's, and they dated for a while.

[snuffbox 0]

I really liked Robert Caro's Means of Ascent on LBJ...it covers his time in Congress in the '40s, his 'service' in WW2, and the incredibly corrupt Senate election of 1948.

[vivalaultra 0]

So, since school started, does anybody have any interesting Literature classes? I'm taking two in, this, my senior year. I'm taking The 18th Century British Novel where I get to read Robinson Crusoe, Pride and Prejudice and the like and a class called Latin American History Through the Novel where I get to read a bunch of Garcia Marquez books that I've already read and some other Latin American authors. I've decided that my favorite genre of literature is Latin American literature. Yeah. Salud!

[FroGG_NeaL 0]

I got to read Robinson Crusoe & Pride and Prejudice in my second first year Lit class.

 

 

I liked both books, just don't try to watch the Pride and Prejudice movie.

[vivalaultra 0]

Yeah, I've already seen the movie. I didn't like it, nor do I care much for the book. It's too...coincidental. I do like Robinson Crusoe. I've read both before. Since this is my last semester in college, I decided that I'd take the classes with the majority of books that I'd already read being taught. I likes taking it easy.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

So, since school started, does anybody have any interesting Literature classes? I'm taking two in, this, my senior year. I'm taking The 18th Century British Novel where I get to read Robinson Crusoe, Pride and Prejudice and the like and a class called Latin American History Through the Novel where I get to read a bunch of Garcia Marquez books that I've already read and some other Latin American authors. I've decided that my favorite genre of literature is Latin American literature. Yeah. Salud!

Isobel Alliende is incredible if you can get into her subject matter.

 

I'm taking Literature of Sport and Games this semester. Most of the books have nothing to do with professional sports, but I've had and enjoyed the professor before so I'm interested in seeing the approach he takes.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

What's on the syllabus for that, al.

[vivalaultra 0]

Yeah, I've read some Allende stuff. Both last semester and this semester, I'm doing The House of the Spirits. I liked it pretty well. I got a copy of Zorro by her, which I'm curious to read.

 

I'm also interested as to what books are in that Sports Lit. class. I was considering taking a class like that-either Health Literature or something else like that. I'm just curious as to how the literature is presented in that type of class, whether you just read books about sports, etc. and discuss the literary merits of them or read books about sports, etc. and discuss the way that the authors use those conventions to make some type of statement about society or whatnot.

[Guest Eyeball Kid]

Maybe you'll be reading Philip Roth's The Great American Novel.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

My first class is on Monday, and I'll be able to relate some of the books after that. I can tell you one of them is Homer's Illiad. Philip Roth's novel isn't on there. I really should read that sometime.

 

I should come up with my own Baseball Lit course.

[Gert T 0]

The Illiead is good shit, as long as the version is good and not too tedious, one of my fav's.

[PUT THAT DICK IN MY MOUTH! 0]

I recommend In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust. It's a little simple and mainstream for my tastes (I read motsly obscure East European postmodernist works (I'm something of an "intellectual," you see)) but it's still pretty all right for what it is and definitely a step above Dan Brown and John Grisham and their ilk.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

haha

[vivalaultra 0]

I recommend In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust. It's a little simple and mainstream for my tastes (I read motsly obscure East European postmodernist works (I'm something of an "intellectual," you see)) but it's still pretty all right for what it is and definitely a step above Dan Brown and John Grisham and their ilk.

 

 

Wait...are you being sarcastic? You must be...

 

Anyway, I'd like to take this opportunity to once again endorse Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Everyone should read something by him...preferably One Hundred Years of Solitude or Love in the Time of Cholera, which is the single greatest book about love and unrequited love ever written.

[Guest Vitamin X]

Mentioning Gabriel Garcia Marquez, I don't know if they have the English version for Memoria de mis putas tristes which I think would translate to Memories of my sad prostitutes/bitches. Pretty interesting read.