What are you reading now - and then

[Stavros]

Agreed about these biographies....seems everybody these days feel the need to divulge the details of their sordid but banal lives and opt to take 'the more due to less' path wherein they substitute the lack of anything interesting with long rambling chapters filled with meaningless bullshit which is somehow meant to deceive the masses into thinking the thing is worth reading.....kinda like reality TV shows.

Books filled with extraneous words may have their roots in Gibbons' The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire in which he carefully uses 100 words where 6 would have sufficed. So I lay some of the blame at the feet of the British.

If you need a home for your books.................I'd be happy to provide one!

1) The development of word processors and then laptops/PCs has been cited as a cause -in the days when a writer sat at a desk with pen and paper, the physical act of writing determined length -now one can sit for hours, days, weeks without stop, so a 250 page book becomes 750 -but where are the editors in the publishing houses on this?

2) Biographies -you now really do need to know how many women Byron slept with (or JFK if they can count them all); how many children -in secret- the Duchess of Tinseltown gave birth to (and by whom); yet you rarely get told that King Charles I was five foot tall when Peter the Great of Russia was six foot eight, and just how big was Cromwell's -or Lincoln's- cock? Also, the only time Louis XIV took a bath was when he was ordered to by his physician who though it might be good for him...and William the Conqueror was the scion of Viking immigrants to Normandy.

3) You blame the British for lots of things, because you are Canadian (I have been to Canada, I know about these things) -maybe you should be more specific and blame the Scots...

[Stavros]

There are a lot of books, even recent publications, that haven't made it to Kindle yet and may never be. Victor Pelevin's Hall of Singing Caryatids is on my list of books to buy at the book store, because it's not available in Kindle format

Description:
After auditioning for the part as a singing geisha at a dubious bar, Lena and eleven other “lucky” girls are sent to work at a posh underground nightclub reserved exclusively for Russia’s upper-crust elite. They are to be a sideshow attraction to the rest of the club’s entertainment, and are billed as the “famous singing caryatids.” Things only get weirder from there. Secret ointments, praying mantises, sexual escapades, and grotesque murder are quickly ushered into the plot. The Russian literary master Victor Pelevin holds nothing back, and The Hall of the Singing Caryatids, his most recent story to be translated into English, is sure to make you squirm in your seat with utter delight.

Trish, I am concerned for your health and well-being....

[Helvis2012]

Gogol.

[runningdownthatdream]

1) The development of word processors and then laptops/PCs has been cited as a cause -in the days when a writer sat at a desk with pen and paper, the physical act of writing determined length -now one can sit for hours, days, weeks without stop, so a 250 page book becomes 750 -but where are the editors in the publishing houses on this?

2) Biographies -you now really do need to know how many women Byron slept with (or JFK if they can count them all); how many children -in secret- the Duchess of Tinseltown gave birth to (and by whom); yet you rarely get told that King Charles I was five foot tall when Peter the Great of Russia was six foot eight, and just how big was Cromwell's -or Lincoln's- cock? Also, the only time Louis XIV took a bath was when he was ordered to by his physician who though it might be good for him...and William the Conqueror was the scion of Viking immigrants to Normandy.

3) You blame the British for lots of things, because you are Canadian (I have been to Canada, I know about these things) -maybe you should be more specific and blame the Scots...

In general, our world has become more prone to over-run - in literature pleonasm (great word!) seems to have become the norm.

Indeed, us Canadians should be blaming the Scots and their predilection for wanting to get everything right regardless of the physical/mental/spiritual consequences. Are they really still so anal in Scotland? Though without their efficiencies the Empire would likely never have accomplished as much as it did.

[trish]

There are a lot of books, even recent publications, that haven't made it to Kindle yet and may never be. Victor Pelevin's Hall of Singing Caryatids is on my list of books to buy at the book store, because it's not available in Kindle format

Description:
After auditioning for the part as a singing geisha at a dubious bar, Lena and eleven other “lucky” girls are sent to work at a posh underground nightclub reserved exclusively for Russia’s upper-crust elite. They are to be a sideshow attraction to the rest of the club’s entertainment, and are billed as the “famous singing caryatids.” Things only get weirder from there. Secret ointments, praying mantises, sexual escapades, and grotesque murder are quickly ushered into the plot. The Russian literary master Victor Pelevin holds nothing back, and The Hall of the Singing Caryatids, his most recent story to be translated into English, is sure to make you squirm in your seat with utter delight.

Trish, I am concerned for your health and well-being....

Of course "Things get weirder from there" got my attention. But I think is was the word "squirm" appearing in the same sentence with "utter delight" that assured its place in my list of books to read. Besides I love caryatids and was previously delighted by Pelevin's Sacred Book of the Werewolf.

[russtafa]

My lady is currently reading The blood countess,the first Pandora English novel series by Tara Moss and is thoroughly enjoying it.It's got that real supernatural theme feel,similar to the true blood series by Charlaine Harris.

[russtafa]

i am reading the Black Company by Glen Cook its about a mercenary company hired by warlocks to fight in a war against rebel warlocks and their soldiers .a great book!

[MatiasTz]

Plato and Carlin - lol

How about Da Vinci and the Da Vinci Code.....

or Aristotle and stephen King etc

Hah! I hadn't thought of Da Vinci and the Da vinci Code!

But I think if you go by sheer volume of sales it should be the Bible and Stephen King. Though I venture to guess more people have actually read King.

How about Machiavelli and Milton Friedman?

[Prospero]

But I think if you go by sheer volume of sales it should be the Bible and Stephen King. Though I venture to guess more people have actually read King.

By now King has written far more words than are in the Bible. He must have have outpaced it tenfold. But I'd argue with the idea that he is more read. The Bible and the Qur'an must be the most read books surely.

[russtafa]

By now King has written far more words than are in the Bible. He must have have outpaced it tenfold. But I'd argue with the idea that he is more read. The Bible and the Qur'an must be the most read books surely.

yeah both a pain in the ass