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Although the Girdle of Melian made me raise an eyebrow, how fat was this elf chick that her girdle could encompass a whole country?

Reading the God Delusion, by Dawkins. Not that I need convincing, rather for school. That said, his descriptions of the 'short cuts' of the mind to process faster 'misfiring' on stimuli that they weren't necessarily designed for being a basis of religions, or accumulating the memes in the same manner, is fascinating. Most people envision themselves as... well themselves inside their bodies, to view it as basically a computer with an app for that, if cool as hell.

I especially like his descriptions of natural selection. I understood it before, but his crane metephors, along with Mount Irreducible was awesome. I also have never heard of the Cargo Cults before and find that fascinating as well, if a bit sad.

yeha I really liked Children of Hurin, but yes Silmirillion is a headache....

Right now, I'm reading Jewell Parker Rhodes' Voodoo Season, which appears to be set in a New Orleans that only exists in badly cliched movies about the city. Can't wait to see just how she's mangled the New Orleans vodou tradition in the bargain.

lol, I keep having to explain to the local fundy hicks that it's a catholic sect combining animism/ancestor worship into a whole slew of new saints and angels. Which seems fine to me given how much christians have taken in european paganism into the official christian lists (Hint: Valentines used to be Lupracal, Christmas used to be a pagan holiday, and the Roman census was NOT in the winter time.)

Well, actually, vodou is an animism/ancestor worship religion which disguised itself as a Catholic sect and, slightly later, as a slew of "Christian Spiritualist" churches which still thrive in New Orleans. Today, the vodou practise is much more open and the current high priestesses (one of whom is a white Jewish woman) are quite public about their roles and the rituals they stage. But I've already seen hints —though I may be mistaken (as I haven't read quite so far yet)— that Rhodes has depicted zombification or something like it, which has actually no part in the local tradition and never has. There is the belief in spirit-possession, but that's an entirely different concept altogether.

Just finished The Samurai's Wife, the fifth book in the Sano Ichiro mystery series. Another good installment, with character development for Sano, Reiko, and even Chamberlain Yanagisawa. It also looks like the series has picked up a new recurring antagonist.

So 5 books down, 10 to go until I'm caught up.

"Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" at the moment. Twelve hundred pages of knee-slapping entertainment, and I'm about 40% of the way through. It follows on the heels of "All Quiet on the Western Front". I'm also reading "That Is All" in my "spare" reading time.

SCRawl wrote:"Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" at the moment. Twelve hundred pages of knee-slapping entertainment, and I'm about 40% of the way through. It follows on the heels of "All Quiet on the Western Front". I'm also reading "That Is All" in my "spare" reading time.

Isn't 'Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" supposed to be terrible?

I'm currently reading A.J.P. Taylor's Struggle for the Mastery of Europe (and avoiding Thanas' wrath in the process), but it's only a holdover until Amazon gets me my copy of the fifth Dresden novel Death Mask.

spaceviking wrote:

SCRawl wrote:"Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" at the moment. Twelve hundred pages of knee-slapping entertainment, and I'm about 40% of the way through. It follows on the heels of "All Quiet on the Western Front". I'm also reading "That Is All" in my "spare" reading time.

Isn't 'Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" supposed to be terrible?

I found it thick going, but as histories go I wouldn't call it 'terrible.' Really almost too subjective a matter, to meaningfully comment upon.

Kanastrous wrote:

spaceviking wrote:

SCRawl wrote:"Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" at the moment. Twelve hundred pages of knee-slapping entertainment, and I'm about 40% of the way through. It follows on the heels of "All Quiet on the Western Front". I'm also reading "That Is All" in my "spare" reading time.

Isn't 'Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" supposed to be terrible?

I found it thick going, but as histories go I wouldn't call it 'terrible.' Really almost too subjective a matter, to meaningfully comment upon.

Probably, I just remediable a prof specifically describing it as such.

I've read a heap of Doctorow lately - most recently Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom.

Currently on Mass Casualties by Michael Anthony. It's a pretty dark picture he's painting.

Steve wrote:I'm currently reading A.J.P. Taylor's Struggle for the Mastery of Europe (and avoiding Thanas' wrath in the process)

My god does my lecturer love that man.
I'm currently trekking through the dross that is Duncan Falconer's 'The protector'. It is quintessentially awful, but I can't not finish a book.
It did however give me the pleasure of having a fellow student come over to me in class and tell me how much he loves it. It really gives me an insight into the literary interests of my... contemporaries.

I did just finish 'Surface Detail' by Ian M. Banks, which was magnificent if a little sardonic at times, as well as 'Arc light' by Eric Harry which was a very well written romp into WW3.

Just finished Know No Fear, which I'm sure Conner will like. Currently reading through the Jag In Space series. Wish I had encountered Jack Campbell earlier on.

I've been reading Knocking on Heaven's Door by Lisa Randall. It's been a mostly good read, although she needs to ease off on the descriptions of the Large Hadron Collider (Randall is a particle physicist, so it's not surprising that she's enthusiastic about the LHC).

I'm also on an Interplanetary Space Opera kick, and I've been reading Charles Sheffield's Cold as Ice. Great stuff so far - I just wish I could find the sequel, The Ganymede Club, at the library.

I'm reading Catch-22 for the first time and loving it. It really relates to my military service, I like Yossarian, was privy to massive amounts of incompetency.

currently attacking the enormus linkage site that is http://bestsciencefictionstories.com/

They haven't steered me to a dud one yet.


EDIT: actually be careful of ones where the autohr has requested to be put up and the gatekeeper has openly said she's not read. that one was not so hot.

Finished the latest Ciaphas Cain book, the Last Ditch.

Going to polish off Firestorm (generic title I know) latest book in the destroyermen series before reading an alt history trilogy recommended to me by Thanas.

I just downloaded A Princess of Mars for free. Let's see how good it is.

I am currently reading several books and awaiting my hardback collections of Charles Addams family, and St. Tirian's School for Young Ladies the whole appaling affair.

I'm in the middle of The Code: The Unwritten Rules of Fighting and Retaliation in the NHL. It appears everyone thinks fighting is an integral part of the game, and everything that is bad happens because The Code isn't being followed thanks to the instigator rule and the third man in rule.

I am reading my Kindle

Yes, I have been drawn into dark side e-book universe. Just finished To Kiss or To Kill from a series I'd be very surprised if anyone else here has heard of, and have started on something called Wool which I can apparently borrow for free. Also recently read Peter Watt's Maelstrom, also in e-format.

You have a Fire, Broomstick?

I just picked up the LOTR Nook book for ten bucks. That's a damn good price.

Also from what I hear Google's new store thingy is running daily 25¢ sales...which Amazon is quietly matching.

How's A Princess of Mars? I got that for free for Kindle, too, and read a couple of pages into it before going to another book. It wasn't bad, so I'll probably go back to it later.

I've just finished Dark as Day, part of a loose trilogy of SF novels by Charles Sheffield set in the Outer Solar System. Both it and Cold as Ice were great, although the former was the better of the two. The library doesn't have The Ganymede Club, so I'm going to get it off amazon for cheap.

My only quibble is that Sheffield may have had a "dirty old man" thing going on, like Harry Turtledove. Almost every POV character in the books has a sex scene, except for the 550 lb obese guy (thank cthulu).