Books on the Nightstand discussion

Thought I would start off the month. I am reading The Executioner's Song...very long book, but it's going fast.

I envy you reading The Executioner's Song for the first time- it's been a long time favourite of mine. I just finished the first Wolf Hall and started The Age of Miracles. David Brin's Existence is next on the list. It's shaping up to be a good month.

Aenea wrote: "I envy you reading The Executioner's Song for the first time- it's been a long time favourite of mine. I just finished the first Wolf Hall and started The Age of Miracles. David Brin's Existence is..."

Aenea,
I just finished Wolf Hall and it's sequel Bring Up the Bodies. I found Wolf Hall to be a little hard to get in to, but once I did I absolutely loved both books. The Age of Miracles is sitting in my summertime reading pile :)

I am currently reading Back Roads, and listening to the audio version of When Will There Be Good News?. I love the Jackson Brodie books, and this one is not letting me down at all!

i just finished re-reading and i have a new appreciation for why it is a classic in the american cannon.

i started last night.

I'm supposed to be reading Remarkable Creatures for book club, but instead I'm reading Breakfast of Champions. I feel like I'm skipping class or something.

@ callie,

Remarkable Creatures is a fairly quick read. and it's interesting. my daughter saw it on my nightstand when i was reading it and asked what it was about. we talked about it for a little while.

months later she read an Ivy and Bean: Break the Fossil Record - Book 3 that mentioned the women discussed in remarkable creatures. she remembered! and i thought, "wow. we read books about the same topic." (she's seven by the way).

Elizabeth wrote: "@ callie,

Remarkable Creatures is a fairly quick read. and it's interesting. my daughter saw it on my nightstand when i was reading it and asked what it was about. we talked about it for a little ..."

Isn't it great when that happens? I also have The Fossil Hunter: Dinosaurs, Evolution, and the Woman Whose Discoveries Changed the World on my TBR list, recommended by brainpickings.org. It looks pretty interesting, and I might read it after Remarkable Creatures, if I can grab it from the library.

thanks for the recommendation callie. i added it to my never ending TBR list.

Still reading

Thumbs up on

Gosh golly, so many books to read for July. I may deviate from my plan, as it assumes I will be attending the Iowa City Book Festival, but my vacation plans changed and I will not be attending. I have already read several books by the authors and I may put off the ones I haven't since I'm not pressed for time to see a reading.

I am currently reading Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet for book group. Then, The Girl with the Pearl Earring for an informal summer book group. Next up, Harry Potter #7 (FINALLY!) and Good Book: The Bizarre, Hilarious, Disturbing, Marvelous, and Inspiring Things I Learned When I Read Every Single Word of the Bible - to fulfill my TBR goals. The ICBF books I have left are The Sharp Time, Heading Out to Wonderful, This Bright River, and The Chaperone. Ohter miscellaneous potential reads: On the Island (doesn't look my type, but comes highly recommended - on hold at the library), Three Bags Full, The Sandcastle Girls, Summer Rental (hey I'm going on vacation to the lake and I love light chick lit reads), Off the Menu (same vacay!), and My Fair Lazy (vacay). Finally, I am waiting to get Wolf Hall from the library. I have been trying to listen to it on audio for two months and am getting nowhere fast. Will try for the sequal on audio since the narrator will be at Santa Cruz.

I might read Gone Girl a little early for August book group because I am really dying to read the thread on it.

I finished yesterday morning while acting as Son's navigator (I only had 2 pages left). We started listening to which we thought was the original Dracula. It's not. We all were liking it.

My book club is reading Gone Girl and I finished that in two days! Next up is The Snow Child and Age of Miracles. If there is time, Richard Ford's Canada will be next.

I'm reading Tigers in Red Weather ...promised to a friend so I picked it out of the massive TBR.

Finished Flirt. It was OK. I've been reading a lot of 'meh' books at the moment. I'm not sure if it is me or the books.

Janet wrote: "I'm reading Tigers in Red Weather ...promised to a friend so I picked it out of the massive TBR."

I just read that this author is the great great great granddaughter of Herman Melville. Maybe it will inspire me to try Moby Dick...again.

- already loving it and I'm under page 30! I didn't realize it was a book about a book.

Finished , while not a huge King fan, this was excellent. I now need to re-read "The Time Machine" by Jules Verne.

Just finished Wild. Am about halfway done with Poison Study and working through A Feast for Crows. Really enjoying both of them.

Linda wrote: " - already loving it and I'm under page 30! I didn't realize it was a book about a book."

This is an all time favorite. Enjoy.

I'm reading Atonementby Ian McEwan. I am trying to read a lot of the books that have been sitting in my TBR for a long time. I don't know why this one has been on TBR for so long. I watched the movie first which is something I try not to do. I read On Chesil Beach and loved it, and have heard Ann rave about McEwan's work from the first BOTNS I listened to. Anyway I am enjoying Atonement even more than I did the movie.

I'm still reading Running With Scissors. It is an easy read and I should have been done ages ago, but life has been busy AND I find some parts so disturbing that I need to put it down for a bit to clear my mind!!

My next book to read will be The Rest Is Silence. It is my bookclub's next selection.

http://thebookbags.blogspot.ca/

I have started Alone in Berlin. I needed some good writing and it is a library book. But I'm having my usual problem with literary fiction. Why are people so sad? Why are their lives so grey?

Linda wrote: " - already loving it and I'm under page 30! I didn't realize it was a book about a book."

Oh my gosh, you will love this. I loved every single page.

I'm so excited to start reading one of my best friend's books that is published/released tomorrow! I didn't read it while she was writing it, so now I get it in the published form. Obviously, I'm biased, but from the portions I have seen, it'll be a fun read.

YA paranormal...Phase

Merely good. It would be wrong to say I expected more, since Stephen King often delivers books that, although they tell a story well, fall short of the suspense and emotional resonance of his best books.

Fans of the Dark Tower series take note: this is not an essential part of the main story. This book picks up in the middle of the saga, after book four. While holed up to wait out a storm, Roland tells his crew a pair of stories, one nested inside the other. One is an adventure from Roland's youth. The other is more of a fairy tale, but one that impacts the lore of the Gunslingers.

If you've never read the Dark Tower books, don't start with this one. Don't even think you need to read it, because you don't. But if you're already a fan of the books, check it out, but with lowered expectations. Have a visit with your old ka-tet: Roland, Eddie, Susannah, and Jack. Sit around the campfire. Have yourself a gunslinger burrito and enjoy some storytelling.

Amy wrote: "Gosh golly, so many books to read for July. I may deviate from my plan, as it assumes I will be attending the Iowa City Book Festival, but my vacation plans changed and I will not be attending. I h..."

Read Gone Girl! If I may be so bold....

I'm reading Gone Girl and really like it.

Just finished The Newlyweds on audio and was not impressed. Wonderful narration though.
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/....

On the other hand really liked A + E 4ever
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

Shona wrote: "Thought I would start off the month. I am reading The Executioner's Song...very long book, but it's going fast."

Shona -- when you're done, check out Mikal Gilmore's SHOT IN THE HEART. It's written by Gary Gilmore's brother, and it's an amazing piece of literature. It was the book I brought to the Booktopia:Oxford Yankee Swap.

Ann wrote: "Shona wrote: "Thought I would start off the month. I am reading The Executioner's Song...very long book, but it's going fast."

Shona -- when you're done, check out Mikal Gilmore's SHOT IN THE HEA..."

shot in the heart both me and my hubby both in and it start out slow but great book

Melodie, did you get the book from the Yankee Swap?

In the summer life is busy (tourist town=extra traffic, guests and commitments) so I go light, decided to try more short fiction since I was blown away byBinocular Vision: New & Selected Stories by Edith Pearlman, as the reviewer in the NY Times said, "it should have won a Pulitzer." Why had a not heard of her before?!? Check this out!

Then there was TODAY'S BEST MAINE FICTION, edited by Wesley McNair, a Maine treasure,almost of these pieces are super works of literature, great storytelling by well-known authors.

For fun I've tried some of the Ian Rutledge mysteries by Charles Todd, set in post WWI, interesting, deep and British but written by Americans, quite good.

We take the summer off from book group, impossible here, but I have to start our classic read, Uncle Tom's Cabin Wish me luck.

I'm jumping on the bandwagon and reading The Age of Miracles. I usually wait awhile before the hype dies down to read a popular book, but I'm a sucker for apocalyptic stories. I just finished rereading The Great Gatsby and I'm really glad I did. I read it so young that it was like reading it for the first time, and I enjoyed it much more.

The Great Gatsby is one of my favorite books ever, thanks to a brilliant high school literature teacher. My daughter is named Jordan because of the book. :)

Ann wrote: "Shona -- when you're done, check out Mikal Gilmore's SHOT IN THE HEART. It's written by Gary Gilmore's brother, and it's an amazing piece of literature. It was the book I brought to the Booktopia:Oxford Yankee Swap. "

I'll vouch for that too. I had been aware of Mikal Gilmore for years before "Shot in the Heart" came out, because he was a longtime rock journalist for Rolling Stone Magazine and I used to read his articles. I was surprised to find he was Gary Gilmore's brother. Good book.

An adaptation of Susan Hill's classic ghost story.

As a script, I'm giving it only three stars, because there's so much to be filled in. To succeed, it requires the hand of a skilled director, three actors, and a crack tech director.

I'm auditioning for it later this month, and I have confidence in the people involved (who I've wanted to work with for a while) to pull off the scares.

I just finished Gone Girl and am now moving on to Game Change (which I started before Gone Girl but got distracted by that and didn't finish). Then I'm reading The Girls of Murder City which is based in Chicago and the basis for the musical apparently so I'm super excited (since I love the musical and this city:) )

After just finishing Gone Girl last night, I bought Dark Places.

Ann wrote: "Shona wrote: "Thought I would start off the month. I am reading The Executioner's Song...very long book, but it's going fast."

Shona -- when you're done, check out Mikal Gilmore's SHOT IN THE HEA..."

Thanks Ann for the recommendation!
I finished The Executioner's Song two days ago and I haven't been able to pick up another book yet...still feel like I'm in that world. I think I may need a fun happy book next...

i finished , which i thought was well written and an interesting story with lots to tell in not so many pages.

i also read a YA book which i found beautifully done.

now i'm reading .

no Ann I did not I wish but no

I've been traveling so much this year, which means I've been reading a lot. The best of my reads for the last couple of months:










Currently working on:




Thanks to Michael for the recommendation on The Secret History - holy cow, it is amazing so far!

I am reading Pure, In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin, How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming, and The House of Silk: A Sherlock Holmes Novel.

I just started reading _The Secret History_ too. I've been wanting to for a while, but the double encouragement from Michael and a listener(I'm sorry I don't remember who!) definitely pushed it up to the top of my pile.

Just finished up via Audible, now moving on to also on Audible.

On real paper, I'm working through while the wife is struggling through , and based on your reccomendations, I thought she'd like it more, but she hasn't been drawn in yet.

I dipped into my pile of 'books on my nightstand' this week and finally read The Year of the Flood. Loved it and think I may need to go back and reread Oryx and Crake. Next up is How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe

I'm reading The World Without You on my IPAD and listening to
Wolf Hall while I also am reading it in a physical Book.
I'm also about 1/3 of the way through Murder at the Lanterne Rouge for Booktopia Santa Cruz (woo too)

I'm reading a rather odd short novel called "A High Wind in Jamaica" by Richard Hughes, published in 1929. I read about it on a book blog and decided to take a chance. It's a very unsentimental, slightly offbeat story of several children, raised in Jamaica in the 1800s by English parents, who are sent back to England to get an education but are captured by pirates enroute. They take to the pirate life quite easily and, as one review says, "commit horrible deeds and have horrible deeds visited upon them." The book is sometimes compared to "Lord of the Flies" as a portrayal of "innocence corrupted," but with more irony and dark humor. I'm not sure if I'll be able to say I like it, but it's a quick read and something different.

My current audiobook is a title that's been on my radar for a while, "The Warmth of Other Suns" by Isabel Wilkerson. It describes the exodus of millions of African-Americans from the South to cities in the Northeast, Midwest, and West from 1915 to 1970. While illustrating the appalling conditions in the Jim Crow South that prompted this massive migration and exploring how it changed numerous aspects of American life, Wilkerson personalizes this important story by following the lives of three individuals who made this move, each in a different decade. An excellent book.