What are you reading this week of November 29, 2015?

[hermetic]

Dragonfly in Amber, soon to be done. I'm feeling the need to take a little break from Outlander so if I can get through the snow to the library in a few days I have a wee list of things to pick up. See that? I'm even starting to talk like THEM. Sheesh.

So, what are you reading as you finish up your leftovers?

[northoftheborder]

1. Love Medicine, by Louise Erdrich

An old one - been lying around. Just started, seems to be good; about Native Americans

I finally finished the Outlander Series!!! Two sentiments: One, sad that I couldn't read any more about that Scottish family I had lived vicariously with for so long! (Find myself saying "wee" and "ken&quot Two, was disappointed in the ending of the last book; I won't spoil it for those still reading, but I think the author just (understandably) got tired of writing this one; several threads of the story not explained in the ending; perhaps she wrote her story into a unsolvable web.

[hermetic]

5. How long did that take

to read all 8? I'm only on the second book and at my *ahem* advanced age I'm not sure I'll make it through all of them. I think I will forego the last one. Have you read any of the Lord John Series? Evidently they are mysteries and I do enjoy a good Scottish who-done-it. I see they are also shorter.

[northoftheborder]

13. Can't remember - months.

I only read at night, until my eyes blur, or I go to sleep and my IPad falls on my face. 30 min. to an hour and a half each day. I didn't read anything else in-between. I skipped Clair's graphic surgery episodes. Too many of those, and too many side stories that didn't contribute to the main narrative. But still gripping in it's historical narrative. Very interesting: the details of the American Revolution, and who was on which side. Also, I gained insight from the Scottish traditions and character traits which were brought to the mountain regions of the South and influence to this day some of the South's culture (not all good).

[japple]

14. Love Medicine is one of my favorite books, but it was not easy reading at first and

Last edited Wed Dec 2, 2015, 08:10 PM - Edit history (1)

until I discovered the rhythm of the work. It is beautifully written, has a dream-like quality. I have read many of Louise Erdrich's books and this remains one of my favorites.

[northoftheborder]

19. Glad to hear your positive review. It is a little hard getting into.

I think it must have been one of my sons' assigned reading in college or high school, that's why it was sitting around my house. His notes and marks make it even more interesting!

[TexasProgresive]

2. Staying with Faye Kellerman and Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus

I really enjoyed Jupiter's Bones and picked up The Ritual Bath. The Decker/Lazarus novels all have a strong Jewish flavor, Haredi Judaism, which is quite powerfully Jewish. The Ritual Bath is where Peter meets Rina. She is a maths teacher who also takes care of the Mikvah a place for ritual purification baths.

As well as being a good story teller Ms. Kellerman weaves a beautiful tallit (prayer shawl) that gives a real sense of Jewish spirituality without preaching. This makes for good reading.

[hermetic]

6. That does sound like

some very good reading.

[Enthusiast]

9. Looks like I am going to have to start reading Faye Kellerman.

I read about that one on Good Reads.

[getting old in mke]

18. I've enjoyed them a lot

Every once in a while I think about Jupiter's Bones when something along those lines shows up in the news.

[dixiegrrrrl]

3. 2 non-fiction about the new South

Confederates in the Attic by Tony Horwitz, who is writes well and has a lovely sense of humor, so I got 2 more of this books.
and
Deep South: Four Seasons on Back Roads by Paul Theroux, who is a very experienced travel writer.

Both are very readable takes on aspects of the South. Of the 2 books, I feel Horwitz nailed it best.

[hermetic]

4. Theroux

I read his The Mosquito Coast a long time ago but I remember that I really liked it.

Confederates in the Attic looks interesting. For some reason my library has 18 copies of it. I will have to take a look at that.

[pscot]

7. The Ghost Brigades by John Scalzi

This the 2nd part of The Old Man's War trilogy. This is a straight up space opera about battling space aliens for lebensraum. It's very well done, Scalzi writes well and his plots are logically consistent, but obviously not for everyone.

[Enthusiast]

10. I read about The Ghost Brigades on Fantastic Fiction.

That is an incredible concept. I hardly ever read science fiction these days unless it is a dystopian novel about the near future. I guess I'm stuck.

[Enthusiast]

8. Hello, everyone! Thank you for the thread, hermetic.

As I expected my reading report won't be very interesting this week as I am still reading The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver. I am nearly finished with The Lacuna. I haven't decided on a next book yet.

Mrs. Enthusiast is also on the same book. She is reading Avenue of Mysteries by John Irving. She is close to the finish.

Anyone else overindulge on Thanksgiving food? Maybe I should write a Thanksgiving food book. I don't mean a cook book. I mean a how to eat it all and survive. What about, How to Enjoy a Gluten Free Thanksgiving Dinner.

[japple]

11. Thanks for the thread, hermetic. I was looking for something new this week and came

across this book: Robert Bausch, Far as the Eye Can See I wanted something similar to Lance Weller's book Wilderness and this seems to fit.

Bobby Hale is a Union veteran several times over. After the war, he sets his sights on California, but only makes it to Montana. As he stumbles around the West, from the Wyoming Territory to the Black Hills of the Dakotas, he finds meaning in the people he meets-settlers and native people-and the violent history he both participates in and witnesses. Far as the Eye Can See is the story of life in a place where every minute is an engagement in a kind of war of survival, and how two people-a white man and a mixed-race woman-in the midst of such majesty and violence can manage to find a pathway to their own humanity.

Robert Bausch is the distinguished author of a body of work that is lively and varied, but linked by a thoughtfully complicated masculinity and an uncommon empathy. The unique voice of Bobby Hale manages to evoke both Cormac McCarthy and Mark Twain, guiding readers into Indian country and the Plains Wars in a manner both historically true and contemporarily relevant, as thoughts of race and war occupy the national psyche.

[Enthusiast]

12. Sounds like my sort of book, japple.

[japple]

15. You might want to put this one on your list. It seemed a bit dull at first, but now I see that

was my own impatience. It is a good story, well-told, totally absorbing.

[Enthusiast]

16. I ordered a used copy.

Thanks for sharing a bit of detail.

[Conch]

17. Pedro Paramo by Juan Ruflo

Began easily enough but the challenges of different narrators and knowing if the characters are dead or alive made the middle of the book a challenge.

I teach 8th grade and try to read this during an independent reading time but always have to keep an eye on the 30+ kids in my room. That might have made the book seem more challenging than it might have otherwise.

Interesting plot of a son fulfilling the wish of his dying mother that he go to find his father in their former village and Rulfo can tell a story. Still, it was a challenge to gnaw through the middle of the book.

[Number9Dream]

20. I just finished "Amazonia" by James Rollins

It was another fast paced, page-turner... very enjoyable.

From the book jacket: "Out of the world's most inhospitable rainforest, a man stumbles into a small missionary village, and within hours, the CIA operative and former special forces soldier is dead. But the most disturbing aspect of Agent Gerald Clark's death has his superiors in Washington baffled. When Agent Clark first came to the Amazon, he had only one arm - the result of a sniper's bullet. But the photograph of him submitted by a Brazilian morgue shows a corpse with two upper limbs fully intact. Now, the government wants Nathan Rand to lead an expedition into the Amazon jungle, accompanied by a team of scientists and a phalanx of experienced U.S. Rangers. For somewhere in the dark, impenetrable depths of the most dangerous region on Earth there are mysteries that must be solved, no matter what the cost in money, materials...or lives."

[Enthusiast]

21. Sounds like some weird wild stuff.

[Number9Dream]

22. Rollins takes actual science and then pushes the envelope

Hello again, Enthusiast. Rollins takes actual science and then pushes the believability envelope. He usually discusses some of the science at the end of each book. He's great at putting his characters in hopelessly dire situations and then getting them out plausibly. Terrific escapist novels.

[Enthusiast]

23. Cool!